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THE PROMISE OF HIS COMING 



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THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 

NEW YORK • BOSTON • CHICAGO • DALLAS 
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THE PROMISE OF HIS 
COMING 

A Historical Interpretation 

and Revolution of the Idea 

of the Second Advent 



BY 
CHESTER CHARLTON McCOWN, Ph.D., D.D. 

Professor of New Testament Literature in 
Pacific School of Religion 



5foro f ark 

THE MACMILLAN COMPANY 

1921 



PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 






COPYRIGHT, 1921, 

By THE MACMILLAN COMPANY. 



Set up and printed. Published December, 1921. 



OtC 



^ 1321 



The Old Testament texts used in this book are taken from the 
American Standard Edition of the Revised Bible, copyrighted 
1 901, by Thomas Nelson & Sons, and are used by permission. 



dC!.A630911 



TO MY FATHER AND MOTHER 
WHO FIRST TAUGHT ME THE 
PLEASURE AND PROFIT OF STUDY 



PKEFACE 

Two things have been undertaken in the following 
pages. First the obscure origin and the slow and uncer- 
tain development of the Hebrew, Jewish, and Christian 
hope of a better world have been set forth. The sources 
of certain particular phases of the premillennial view have 
been indicated, tut to attempt this with any approach to 
completeness would have required too much space. 

This historical survey secures a proper basis of opera- 
tions for the second part of the task, the attempt to indi- 
cate and reinterpret the fundamental social and religious 
values of the Christian hope of the second coming of 
Christ. I have long felt that large numbers of modern 
Christians did not properly estimate the historical influ- 
ence or present importance of Premillennialism, or, to use 
a still more pedantic term, apocalypticism. Until a his- 
torical interpretation and revaluation of this complex of 
ideas is accepted in the churches they will be at a great 
strategic disadvantage in meeting the attacks of unbelief. 
The Premillennialist is tactically in a position much su- 
perior to other Christians who have a merely negative view 
on the subject, for he has a perfectly definite and clear- 
cut plan of campaign. 

Large areas of biblical and subsequent Christian 
literature are valueless to the average churchmember, be- 
cause of their strange eschatological growths and forbidding 
apocalyptic colorings. From these fields the Adventist 
and Premillennialist reap rich harvests. They will yield 
even more abundantly to a cultivation which does not mis- 
use them. Experience has convinced me that only the 

vii 



viii Preface 

historical interpretation of these passages can bring out 
their inherent values. 

The inevitable difficulties of the task must be frankly 
recognized. The average earnest Christian will probably 
find that the premillennial point of view seems simpler and 
more fruitful. Superficially it is so. It is easy to under- 
stand and it fits many of the facts of experience, enough 
to give it the appearance of plausibility. The arguments 
for the views herein supported may seem to some abstract 
and abstruse, just as the evidences used to prove that the 
world is round and turns upon its axis appear far-fetched 
to the untutored savage. The chief difficulty, however, is 
that the doctrines of the inspiration of the Scriptures and 
the divinity of Christ are involved. Naive and unrea- 
soned views on these subjects are the great barriers to 
intelligent use of the Scriptures. Lingering reminiscences 
of the doctrine of verbal inspiration still affect the inter- 
pretation of many who have ostensibly repudiated it. But 
the crucial question is the attitude of Jesus toward apoca- 
lyptic doctrine. His faith and teaching on the subject, as 
it may be determined by scientific historical study, deter- 
mine our estimate of his character and person. The cur- 
rent estimates of both liberal and conservative now stand 
in need of revision in the light of the progress which this 
study has made. I have tried briefly to indicate the direc- 
tion which this revision must take. 

It will be plain at once to the reader that I have not 
written for the scholar. I have tried to present views 
that will stand the test of scholarly investigation, but 
with as little of technical language as the subject permitted. 
I have quoted freely from the Jewish and Christian 
sources, in order that the reader who does not have access 
to the originals or their published translations may have 
the basis for the views adopted plainly set forth for his 
own judgment. I have wished to promote independent 
thinking on the part of laymen and ministers as well as 
students. The footnotes and bibliography have been in- 



Preface ix 

tended to point the way to further study, as well as par- 
tially to acknowledge the writer's indebtedness. My thanks 
are due Dr. Doremus Scudder for permission to use his 
poem "Where is your Lord?" quoted on pp. 220 f. and 
to various publishers : to Messrs. Thomas Nelson and Sons 
for the Old Testament texts quoted in Chapters II-IV 
from the American Standard Version ; to the Oxford Uni- 
versity Press for quotations in Chapter V from Charles, 
Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha of the Old Testament; 
and to the G. H. Doran Company for the use of Moffatt's 
New Translation of the New Testament in Chapters 
VI-VII. 

These chapters had their inception during the recent 
war. Most of the material was used more than once in 
popular lectures and has not been substantially altered. I 
hope it will prove to have more than war-time value. The 
subject at least is of perennial interest. 

C. C. McCow]*. 
Berkeley, California, 

August 15, 1921. 



CONTENTS 

Chapter I. Watchman, What of the Night ? 1-30 

Sec. L The crisis of faith: despair of 
Christianity and the Church caused by the 
war ; failure of the hopes of "reconstruction" ; 
a perennial problem, is the world growing bet- 
ter or worse ? Disraeli's pessimism ; despair 
in ancient Egypt ; expectation of a cataclysmic 
end of the world ; the two contrasted interpre- 
tations of the Bible 1-11 

Sec. II. The evolutionary point of view: 
propaganda under a millenarian mask, Spir- 
itualism, Vegetarianism, Theosophy; alleged 
reincarnations of Christ; Postmillennialism ; 
sociological expectations ; liberal theology ; so- 
cial Christianity; foreign missions 11-17 

Sec. III. Supernaturalistic solutions : 
Seventh-Day Adventists ; Premillennialism, 
American and English ; the War a forerunner 
of the final catastrophe ; "reconstruction" im- 
possible 17-26 

Sec. IV. The study of Eschatology: new 
materials ; the "liberal" portrait of Jesus ; the 
Jesus of "thorough-going Eschatology" ; the 
significance of the problem; the solution 
through historical study 26-30 

Chapter II. The Day of Yaiiweh 31-59 

Sec. I. The foundation of the Hebrew 
national hope : Yahweh's choice of Israel and 

xi 



xii Contents 

covenant with them involved their prosperity 

as proof of his greatness 31-39 

Sec. II. Popular theology and the day of 
Yahweh: sources; use of the term; a day of 
victory; a natural catastrophe; a world 
cataclysm 39-46 

Sec. III. Mythological influences : biblical 
use of mythology ; three myths eschatologically 
interpreted, the primeval monster, the divine 
Savior, the Golden Age, sources of apocalyptic 
language and ideas 46-53 

Sec. IV. The expected Golden Age: 
Israel's anticipated power and prosperity ; the 
transformation of nature ; no messianic expec- 
tation ; summary 53-59 

Chapter III. Prophetic Reinterpketation . . 60-88 

Sec. I. The day of wrath : prophetic use of 
popular language ; a historical and social catas- 
trophe ; the Captivity as the day of Yahweh ; 
the "day" postponed; signs of the end 60-68 

Sec. II. The cause and purpose of Yah- 
weh' s self -manifestation : Israel's dilemma : 
was Yahweh powerless or was he punishing 
his people ? the moral interpretation of the 
day of Yahweh; suffering as a preparation 
for service , 68-75 

Sec. III. The objects of Yahweh's wrath : 
the prophets' expanding horizon ; judicial dis- 
crimination; the righteous remnant; indi- 
vidual responsibility; judgment transferred 
from Israel to her enemies 75-81 

Sec. IV. After the day of Yahweh: 
literary problems; moral renewal to prepare 
for an age of righteousness ; a messianic or a 
divine kingdom 81-87 



Contents xiii 

Sec. V. The prophetic contribution : moral 
and social reinterpretation of popular escha- 
tology ; the idea of service 87 f . 

Chapter IV. New Problems and New 

Solutions 89-109 

Sec. I. Disappointed hopes: politics and 
apocalypticism ; the repeated failures of apoc- 
alyptic expectations led to Pharisaic quietism 
and Sadducean indifference; hostility of offi- 
cials and apocalyptists ; supremacy of Zelotic 
apocalypticism A. D. 66-135 *. 89-96 

Sec. II. The effect of their religious de- 
velopment upon the hopes of the Jews: the 
development of the canon and of the doctrine 
of inspiration; reactions to foreign influ- 
ences 97-101 

Sec. III. Jewish visions and revelations: 
anonymous, or pseudonymous ; "apocalyptic" . 101-103 

Sec. IV. Rise and development of apoca- 
lyptic literature: character of apocalyptic 
visions; four periods and their literature: 
Ezekiel to the Maccabees; the Maccabean 
period; the Pharisaic period; the Zelotic 
period 103-109 

Chapter V. A Counsel of Despair 110-139 

Sec. I. The chief ideas of apocalypticism : 
evils preceding the end ; the day of judgment ; 
a cosmic catastrophe; war in heaven; over- 
throw of the mighty; revelations of secrets; 
vindication of the righteous ; a divine, or mes- 
sianic kingdom ; various ideas of the messiah, 
Levitic, Davidic, human but sinless, angelic — 
the Son of Man; the resurrection 110-130 

Sec. II. The basic principles of apoca- 
lypticism: its philosophy of history, pessi- 



xiv Contents 

mistic, deterministic, externalistic, literalistic, 

universalistic, idealistic 130-136 

Sec. III. The general character of apoca- 
lypticism: compared with prophecy; its 
course of development; its complexities and 
inconsistencies 136-139 

Chapter VI. The Kingdom at Hand 140-166 

Sec. I. The religious situation in Jesus' 
day: the many parties; Jewish orthodoxy; 
apocalypticism the chief heterodoxy; its at- 
tractiveness for the people 140-144 

Sec. II. Jesus and the prophets: Jesus' 
religious and political problem; the heter- 
odoxy of Jesus not thorough-going apocalyp- 
ticism; his worldview; his conception of the 
kingdom; indicated in his Temptation; his 
evaluation of suffering . 144-153 

Sec. III. The apocalyptic element in the 
teaching of Jesus: apocalypticism the domi- 
nant category in Jewish social thinking; its 
prominence in Jesus' teaching; the elimina- 
tion of the Markan apocalypse; summary 
of Jesus' apocalyptic teaching 153-158 

Sec. IV. The meaning of Jesus' apoca- 
lyptic language: various methods of interpre- 
tation; not to be explained away; apocalyp- 
ticism the only adequate existing category 
to describe his unique task and to express his 
divine self-consciousness, his faith in God, 
his chosen method, his sense of urgency; lit- 
eral, figurative, or symbolic ? two contradictory 
elements 158-166 

Chapter VII. A Living and Blessed Hope. .167-191 

Sec. I. The primitive apostolic faith: its 
deep apocalyptic coloring; its peculiarities; 



Contents xv 

the "second advent" the keystone to their 
faith; Acts; Paul, I. Th., II Th., postpone- 
ment, I Co., later letters, summary; I Pt. . .167-177 

Sec. II. The Judean crisis: the Markan 
"fly-sheet"; the fall of Jerusalem to be the 
end of the world; Matthew, distinguishes the 
fall of the city and the end, heightens the 
apocalyptic coloring; inconsistencies 177-182 

Sec. III. The Domitianic crisis: the 
Revelation, a Christian adaptation and sys- 
tematization of Jewish apocalyptic 182-184 

Sec. IV. The second generation: apoca- 
lypticism becomes dogma rather than faith; 
I Clement; Hebrews; James; the Pastorals; 
Jude and II Peter; the Didache 185-191 

Chapter VIII. Three Millenniums of 

Waiting 192-202 

Sec. I. The millennium of biblical his- 
tory: the development of Jewish apocalyptic; 
Christianity apocalyptic and prophetic, 
heterodox and enthusiastic, not uniform and 
consistent except measurably in the Revela- 
tion 192-191 

Sec. II. The millenarian system; its 
historical representatives; matters of disa- 
greement; points of agreement 194-197 

Sec. III. Objections to Premillennialism : 
its origin; falsified by history; literalism; 
dualism; otherworldliness 197-200 

Sec. IV. Other theories: Postmillennial- 
ism unsatisfactory; the resurrection and 
spectacular judgment; individualistic inter- 
pretation 200-202 



<^ 



xvi Contents 

Chaptej* IX. The Second Advent 203-222 

Sec. I. The modern Christian's dilemma : 
a fundamental doctrine neglected or scorned; 
a fundamental human hope in question; the 
Bible in the balance 203-207 

Sec. II. A social-spiritual interpretation: 
the social and spiritual emphasis of Jesus; 
the Johannine interpretation of the second 
advent as spiritual; John 14-16 versus Mark 
13; a present judgment; the messianic vic- 
tory present and progressive ; its social fruits ; 
the "social Gospel" of Luke ; its version of the 
Markan apocalypse; its prophetic spirit 207-214 

Sec. III. The values of Premillennialism \ i 
conserved in the social-spiritual view: apoca- 
lypticism a "pedagogue," its driving power, 
tension; the fundamental motives of the so- 
cial-spiritual view, communion with Christ, 
present judgment, present vindication of 
righteousness, social progress, the catastrophic 
element in evolution, the signs of the times, 
sub specie aeternitatis, tension, faith 215-234 

HISTORICAL TABLE OF APOCALYP- 
TIC LITERATURE 235-238 

INDEX OF PASSAGES CITED 239-247 

GENERAL INDEX 249-256 



THE PROMISE OF HIS 
COMING 

CHAPTER I 

WATCHMAN, WHAT OF THE NIGHT ? 

I. The Crisis of Faith 

THE war has brought to a crisis the fundamental 
differences of world view and the deep seated per- 
plexities that were seething in men's minds before the storm 
broke. On the surface the world seemed to be moving 
toward a period of unexampled prosperity. The progress 
of science, discovery, and invention, the seeming advances 
toward the solution of industrial, social, and international 
differences, the spread of learning, the outward improve- 
ment of morals, the gains in political democracy, the 
conquests of Christian missions, all seemed to point toward 
the realization of that "one far-off divine event, to which 
the whole creation moves." And then, without warning, 
a pistol shot in Sarajevo brought all the magnificent palace 
of man's fancied achievements down upon his head with a 
completeness of destruction that history had never before 
witnessed. 

"If there is a God, where is he ?" How many thousands 
have thought or uttered that question ! Professor William 
Adams Brown reports a friend to have said, "I do not 
see how I can go on living. It seems as if I had lost God 
out of my world." 1 

Both friends and foes of Christianity said that the 
1 Is Christianity Practicable? (New York, 1916), p. 1. 

1 



2 The Promise of His Coming 

gospel of Christ had failed. Kepresentative of a large 

number is the following: 

'*What Christianity has definitely failed to do, after 
nineteen centuries of trial, is to redeem human life from 
the worst of its evils. The Christianity which has failed 
is Christianity as it has prevailed up to date, a Chris- 
tianity founded on the apotheosis of suffering and the 
multitude of doctrines associated therewith, . . . 
Christianity with its long record of failure, now definitely 
stamped as final by the war. . . . The war is an 
unmixed and unqualified evil ; and there is no Christian, 
sanctify it as he may, now it has taken place, who would 
not have prevented it had he understood the temper of 
the nations who are engaging in it, and known how to 
utilize this for beneficent purposes. Inasmuch as they 
have displayed no such understanding and energy and 
ingenuity, Christians must charge themselves with definite 
failure to make their religion efficacious — failure, too, 
in the province of activity that is peculiar to them." 1 

Others made a less sweeping judgment. The British 
Society of Friends in an address to the public in 1914 
said, "The war spells the bankruptcy of much that we too 
lightly call Christian. No nation, no church, no indi- 
vidual, can be wholly exonerated." 2 Many solaced them- 
selves with the thought that "Christianity had not been 
tried," or that it was the churches that had failed. "Or- 
ganized Christianity" was at fault. Dr. Charles F. Aked 
said, 

"Since the first, or perhaps the second century, the 
churches of Christ have never been true to Christ . . . 
The churches of Christ have not obeyed Christ because 
they have not believed in Him. They have been sure 
of the *big battalions/ but doubtful of the Lord who was 
to be with them unto the end of the ages. They have 
ranged themselves on the side of rampant militarism, 

^Hiboert Journal, vol. xiv (Jan., 1916) pp. 320 ff., Miss M. E. 

Robinson. 
2 Quoted in The Pacific, San Francisco, Sept. 16, 1914, p. 7. 



The Crisis of Faith 3 

blessed the war flags of the nations and urged the war-mad 
millions to 'fight to a finish/ In England the official 
representative of the national church comes to a meeting 
and says he is there to justify the war with Germany 'in 
the name of his Master and Prince of Peace' — he uses 
those very words. In Germany the greatest of all living 
theologians, from whom every preacher in the world 
capable of learning has learned something, denounces 
England as a traitor to civilization, and the clergy call 
to the God of battles to aid in her destruction ! Joaquin 
Miller, contemplating such things in his day, grew fierce 
in his onslaught upon such lovers of Christ : 

'Behold, this was His last command! 

Yet ye dare to cry to Christ in prayer 

With red and reeking sword in hand, 

Ye dare to do as devils dare ! 

Ye liars — great and small; 

Ye cowards, cowards, cowards all P ,n 

After drawing an exceedingly vivid picture of the hor- 
rors of the war just closed, Dr. S. D. Gordon writes, 

"Christianity has broken down, or, at least, something 
has broken down that bore that label in large capitals. 
Certainly there was not enough of the real article in 
Central Europe to prevent the hellish outbreak. And 
there wasn't enough outside to keep it from breaking 
out. The salt in common use had lost its saltiness. It 
didn't keep things healthful. The common conven- 
tional type of Christianity certainly has broken down. 
And it is a bad breakdown, too." 2 

With the majority this mood of questioning did not last 
long. They began almost at once to look forward to 
"reconstruction." Men were pathetically eager to record 
that the beginnings of the war in France, Russia, Germany, 

1 Quoted from an address in the Scottish Rite Auditorium, San 

Francisco, Sept. 20, 1914, reported in The Pacific, Sept. 23, 
1914, p. 6. 

2 Quiet Talks on the Deeper Meaning of the War (New York, 1919)', 

p. 43. 



4 The Promise of His Coming 

England, and America drove people to the churches. 
Danger and death bred a certain exaltation of mood, a 
readiness to sacrifice, a turning to deeper and higher things 
that was hailed as a religious conversion. Under the 
chastening hand of war, faith was coming to its own. The 
soldier in the trenches showed a seriousness that discovered 
"the religion of the inarticulate" underneath the surface. 
As the war went on it was found — alas ! on both sides — 
that it could be won only as the highest and noblest motives 
were called into action. Each side had to play upon these 
profounder feelings. The war was being fought for the 
sake of the world: to give it the blessings of "deutsche 
Kultur," to save it from English greed, French frivolity, 
and Slav barbarism ; or to save civilization from German 
brutality and Prussian militarism, to make the world safe 
for democracy. 

Almost from the beginning the heart of the world tried 
to rest itself from the strain of conflict and carnage by 
looking forward to the "new era" which should dawn 
when the night of wrath had passed. Just as the struggle 
was reaching its final climax, that staunch optimist, David 
Starr Jordan, wrote, 

"As the war goes on, we glimpse the dawn of a 
larger freedom. 'War to end war' now looks forward 
to the achievement of a 'clean peace' on the basis of 
a 'new morality' among nations, a settlement in which 
no selfish interests, national or personal, shall prevail, 
and no political or territorial advantage be gained by 
military invasion. Such an ending will find few 
precedents in history. It is the part of democracy to 
create precedent." 1 

The month after the armistice had been signed, Pro- 
fessor John Dewey published an article, which he may 
have had in waiting for some time, calling attention to 

1 Democracy and World Relations (New York, 1918), p. 3. 



The Crisis of Faith 5 

the futility of expecting these rosy hopes to be fulfilled. 
He said, 

"Seriousness, determination and constant preoccupa- 
tion with the future, with what is coming next, marks 
the human response in war. . . . The concentration 
upon the future characteristic of war inevitably takes a 
rosy hue. . . . Every great war is to usher in a 
time of enduring peace; it is to see the establishment of 
justice, the dawn of a new era. Millennial expectations 
are not born in times of prosperity. In such days, the 
absorbing present is good enough. The millennium is 
the compensatory refuge of immediate distress and im- 
minent evil. But victory generates buoyancy and buoy- 
ancy is likely to find vent in quick satisfactions. The 
paradise of surrounding milk and honey displaces the 
new order that has to be labored for. . . . With the 
let up of war, with the issue determined, the tension re- 
laxes, and the immediate present regains with added 
force its command. Not the arduous labor of recon- 
struction, but the enjoyment of the present, of the gains 
to be snatched from using the opportunities of pleasure 
and profit in things as they are captures the mind." 1 

Professor Dewey disclaims the role of prophet, but 
enough time has elapsed to show that he predicted truly. 
The peace treaty has proved a complete disillusionment. 
Perhaps it was the best obtainable; perhaps it is a step 
toward the solution of international difficulties; but be- 
ginning with that fundamental phrase "open covenants 
openly arrived at," practically all of President Wilson's 
idealistic demands have been openly flouted. Mankind 
has not been regenerated in the blood bath of the war. 
Class suspicion and hatred, narrow and selfish nationalism, 
bitter racial animosities, even denominational jealousies, 
have been accentuated, if not increased, by the heat of the 
great conflict. The fires of suffering seem not to have 
purified the hearts of men, but to have embittered them. 

1 "The Post- War Mind," in The New Republic, Dec. 7, 1918, p. 157. 



6 The Promise of His Coming 

Can we suppose that we have come to the end of wars, 
that this war fought to end war has really succeeded in its 
ultimate purpose ? The signs of the times hardly warrant 
such a hope. On the very day that the treaty was finally 
ratified last January, Marshal Foch warned the world 
that the last war had not been fought, that armaments 
cannot at once be discarded. Mankind is not yet ready 
for the reign of the Prince of peace. 

In the face of the world situation, can we pray, "Thy 
kingdom come, Thy will be done, on earth as it is in 
heaven ?" Can we believe that there is any prospect that 
all mankind will be brought to acknowledge Jesus as King 
of kings and Lord of lords? It would appear that the 
heart of man is fundamentally wrong, and that it is in 
need of a complete transformation. Is there any possi- 
bility that through the ordinary course of preaching the 
Gospel, spreading the doctrines of the righteousness of 
God, the love of Christ, and the duties of man to his fel- 
low, this world can really be saved ? Or must there come 
some cataclysmic change into the course of nature and 
society so as to make it possible for men to serve God and 
love one another? No Christian doubts that right will 
triumph, that God will eventually save the world. The 
question is, How is it to be done ? 

It is a very practical question. If in the long run the 
preaching of the Gospel is to reach only a few, if all the 
efforts to make its truths take hold upon society are futile, 
then our duty as Christians is to seek those few and worry 
as little as possible about society. If this present creation, 
physical and human, material and social, is hopeless and 
must be transformed before the will of God can be done 
on earth, then our task as Christians will be one thing. 
It will be quite another if we can believe that God is able 
to save men, and enough of them, and save them so thor- 
oughly that, in spite of our present physical limitations, 
we can construct a saved society on this earth, a society in 
which in a true, though necessarily limited sense, the will 



The Crisis of Faith 7 

of God will be done, "as it is in heaven." These two 
contradictory views of the workings of God in his world 
we are to discuss in the succeeding pages. 

This is a perennial problem. It is not merely the war 
as such that raises the question as to the faith of Christian- 
ity and civilization, but the war as the fruit of the whole 
of our boasted culture. A few in the nineteenth century, 
who were able to look beneath our showy veneer of ma- 
terial progress, felt the difficulty. In Tancred Disraeli 
wrote, 

"Progress to what and from whence? Amid empires 
shrivelled into deserts, amid the wrecks of great cities, a 
single column or obelisk of which nations import for the 
prime ornament of their mud-built capitals; amid arts 
forgotten, commerce annihilated, fragmentary literatures, 
and populations destroyed, the European talks of prog- 
ress, because by an ingenious application of some scien- 
tific acquirements he has established a society which has 
mistaken comfort for civilization. . . . Amid the 
wreck of creeds, the crash of Empires, French revolutions 
and English reforms, Catholicism in agony, Protestantism 
in convulsions, Europe demands the keynote which none 
can sound. If Asia be in decay, Europe is in couiu- 
sion." 1 

In thus comparing the recent and western with the 
ancient and eastern, Disraeli seems to have overlooked the 
fact that there was the same dissatisfaction in the midst 
of that ancient culture that he seems to regard as superior 
to our own, because, forsooth, it laid less emphasis on 
comfort. When history was young, the world was already 
old, and men looked back on the olden times as better 
than the present, bemoaning the decay and corruption of 
their own days and longing for relief and redemption. 
Our oldest records of such dissatisfaction come from 
Egypt two thousand years before Christ. One of the 

1 Quoted by Figgis, Civilization at the Cross Roads, (New York, 
1912), p. 16 ff. 



8 The Promise of His Coming 

songs in the remarkable "Dialogue of the Misanthrope 
with his Soul" runs, 

"To whom do I speak today? 

Brothers are evil, 

Friends of today are not of love. 

To whom do I speak today ? 

Hearts are thievish, 

Every man seizes his neighbor's goods. 

To whom do I speak today ? 
The gentle man perishes, 
The bold-faced goes everywhere. 

To whom do I speak today ? 

He of the peaceful face is wretched, 

The good is disregarded in every place. 



To whom do I speak today ? 

There are no righteous, 

The land is left to those who do iniquity. 

To whom do I speak today ? 
Evil smites the land, 
It hath no end." 1 

About the same time a priest of Heliopolis, Khekhe- 
perre-sonbu by name, wrote a similar indictment of so- 
ciety : 

"I am meditating on the things that have happened, 
the events that have occurred in the land. Transforma- 
tions go on, it is not like last year, one year is more 
burdensome than the next. . . . Eighteousness is 
cast out; iniquity is in the midst of the council-hall. 
The plans of the gods are violated, their dispositions are 
disregarded. The land is in distress, mourning is in 

1 Breasted, Development of Religion and TJwught in Ancient Egypt 
(New York, 1912), pp. 193 ff. 



The Crisis of Faith 9 

every place, towns and districts are in lamentation. All 
men alike are under wrongs; as for respect, an end is 
made of it. . . . The poor man has no strength to 
save himself from him that is stronger than he. . . . m 

An equally vigorous denunciation of existing conditions 
is found in the "Admonitions of Ipuwer," coming from 
the same period. But this prophet of doom also sees the 
possibility of reform under the glorious reign of a king 
who shall really shepherd his people. 2 

This alternation of hope and despair comes to us from 
the pages of all subsequent history. Men saw in their 
own times only evil, but they dreamed that the Golden 
Age at the happy beginning before man's fall would some- 
time, somehow, return. 

The problem we are discussing, then, has been of com- 
pelling interest since long before the Hebrew prophets. 
Successive waves of concern have passed over the western 
world. Ages of rapid development and expansion have 
been too fully occupied with material things. Then have 
come dissatisfaction, reaction, despair. The interest felt 
by the general public today is partly artificial, that is, 
stimulated by propaganda and discussion, partly natural, 
the result of the perennial human dissatisfaction with the 
present and longing for the Golden Age. Just before the 
war this interest seemed to be increasing, owing to agita- 
tion within the church. The influence of the Moody 
Bible Institute in Chicago, the ]STorthfield schools and 
conferences, the Los Angeles Bible Institute, and of cer- 
tain outstanding evangelists and preachers has had much 
to do with this development. For years they have been 
preaching that the world was growing worse and that only 
the catastrophic return of Christ could save it. The war 
brought a tidal wave of interest, to be seen in books and 
pamphlets, newspaper reports, articles in periodicals, ser- 
mons, and discussions. 

1 Ibid., pp. 200 f . 
3 Hid., pp. 203-216. 







10 The Promise of His Coming 

Since the close of the war, less attention has been given 
to the numerous irresponsible and often fictitious prophe- 
cies that flooded the newspapers for a time, but real inter- 
est in the subject of Christ's second coming has not abated 
' in the least. Judging from the publication and sale of 
books on the subject and the meetings held in which it is 
discussed, serious inquiry seems even to be on the increase. 
The very disappointment which so many have felt at the 
outcome of the Peace Conference, the unsettled economic 
and political conditions in such large portions of the world, 
the uncertainty as to the future, is increasing the doubting 
mood which was already developing before the war. 

The interest in this question is heightened by the popu- 
lar alarm at the recent "scientific" prophecies that the 
world was to come to an end. Professor Porta may never 
have hinted at such an outcome of the conjunction of the 
planets on December 17, 1919. But when it was so re- 
ported in some newspaper, the public all over America took 
up the matter with more or less of alarm or amusement, 
depending upon the individual's world view. The result- 
ing humorous incidents, the miners in Oklahoma who are 
said to have refused to work, the Ohio farmer who paid fif- 
teen dollars for a reserved seat, the people in the Catskills 
who read their Bibles as never before, the negroes in 
Louisiana who held all day services in their church, con- 
cern us only in so far as they show how many are still 
expecting a cataclysmic end of our universe. In Ameri- 
can history we have records of previous seasons of similar 
concern. The "dark day" of 1780, the "falling stars" of 
1833, 1 the Millerite calculations of 1843 and 1844, the 
Mother Shipton prophecy pointing to 1881, all these have 
led thousands to look for the Judgment Day. 

1 Both are still used by Adventists and Premillennialists to prove the 
nearness of the Second Advent; see Signs of the Times, Moun- 
tain View, Calif., Aug. 26, 1919, p. 10, article by Varner J. 
Johns, "Harbingers of the Messiah." 



The Evolutionary Point of View 11 

What has the Christian to expect ? It is important for 
lis to know whether the Bible gives a real basis for the 
belief that God plans suddenly to wind up the affairs of 
this planet in a great catastrophe. If it be true that "the 
day of the Lord will come like a thief, when the heavens 
will vanish with crackling roar, the stars will be set ablaze 
and melt, the earth and all its works will disappear/' then 
"what holy and pious men ought you to be in your be- 
havior?" 1 

The question usually takes the form of inquiry into the 
real meaning of those portions of the Bible w T hich seem 
so plainly to substantiate the contentions of Adventists 
and Premillennialists. Must we accept conclusions which 
are anti-scientific and anti-social, or must we discard the 
Bible, if not in toto, at least in large part ? What is real 
Christianity ? 

The two contrasted points of view from which this 
whole complex of ideas — the end of the world, the coming 
of the millennium, the transformation of society — is 
viewed should be carefully differentiated. The one view 
is evolutionary and naturalistic, the other catastrophic and 
supernaturalistic. The first holds that in the course of 
social evolution evil will gradually be overcome and more 
and more righteousness will come to prevail in society ; the 
second that only by an intervention from without, a divine 
interposition into the affairs of men which shall miracu- 
lously alter present conditions and laws of life, is it pos- 
sible for the world to become better. The incompatibility 
of these two points of view is plain. Where do our mod- 
ern social and religious bodies and movements stand ? 

II. The Evolutionary Point of View 

Too often propaganda adopts scriptural language to 
cover up its real nature. For example, Dr. Anna Kings- 

X II Pt. 3:10, 11. 



12 The Promise of His Coming 

ford said before the National Association of Spiritualists 
in England in 1917, 

"Of what avail will Spiritualism prove to ourselves or 
to the age unless it make the world purer, sweeter, more 
just and more godly ? Wherefore, I at least, as one Spir- 
itualist among many will be instant in season and out of 
season, with voice, pen and desire, to hasten the advent 
of the kingdom of God, and the age of the 'new heavens 
and new earth in which justice dwelleth/ ,n 

The British vegetarian society called the "Order of the 
Golden Age" aims to promote a bloodless diet, for phil- 
anthropic, ethical, humane, and hygienic reasons, and "to 
proclaim and hasten the coming of a Golden Age, when 
Health, Humaneness, Peace, and Spirituality shall pre- 
vail upon Earth." 2 Similarly Theosophy has developed 
its own doctrine of the coming of the better age, based 
upon its peculiar view of the evolution of the "seven 
races" of mankind. According to Mrs. Besant we may 
now be expecting the advent of the great teacher, the suc- 
cessor of Buddha, Christ, and Mohammed, who will de- 
velop a new race, superior to any that have gone before. 3 

These proclamations of a modified millenarianism are 
cited, not for their intrinsic value, but as illustrations of 
the universal appeal of the hope of a better age and the 
common adoption of its language. As the Persian longed 
for the coming of Saoshyant, the Hindu for Kalki, the 
Mohammedan for the Mahdi, and the ancient Greek and 
Roman for the return of the Golden Age, so men are still 
hoping and praying and working for the coming of a new 

1 Herald of the Golden Age, etc., XIX 8 (Oct., 1917), pp. 188 ff. 

Dr. Kingsford was the "first president of the British Theo- 
sophical Society." 

2 See its organ, The Herald of the Golden Age and British Health 

Review, edited by Sidney H. Beard. 
2 Her ideas were developed in The Changing World, London, 1910, 
and in subsequent numbers of the Theosophist. See Farquhar, 
Modei~n Religious Movements in India (New York, 1915), pp. 
274-277. 



The Evolutionary Point of View 13 

era of peace and happiness. It seems to be the tendency 
of these new movements to express themselves in terms of 
this universal, age-long hope. But their methods and 
ideals have nothing of the urge of the judgment day be- 
hind them. Think right, eat vegetables, or learn to com- 
municate with the spirit world, and all will come out right 
in the end. Such movements and programs have little 
connection with the coming of the kingdom of God. 

A whole series of self-deluded fanatics or scheming im- 
postors have preached that the second coming had already 
taken place — in them or in some contemporary. From the 
days of the pseudo-messiahs of New Testament times down 
to Pastor Russell, there have always been numerous be- 
lievers for every such vagary. Antoinette Bourignon on 
the Continent, Ann Lee, founder of the Shakers, in Eng- 
land and America, Mirza Ali Mohammed and Baha Ullah, 
founders of Bahaism, Sri Krishna Murti Ayer among 
Theosophists, Cyrus R. Teed, and others who have claimed 
to be Christ come a second time, show how credulous the 
human race can be. Pastor Russell was the most success- 
ful of recent exponents of such a theory, largely, perhaps, 
because he made it less personal. Despite the failure of 
his prophecies concerning the war and the partial sup- 
pression, of his propaganda by the Government, Ruther- 
ford, his successor, seems still to be continuing the imposi- 
tion. All these are to be classed as evolutionary rather 
than supernaturalistic, for they look for no catastrophic 
announcement of the second advent, but rather think of 
the reappearance of the spiritual Christ in human flesh. 
They are hardly worth discussing, however, for events have 
long ago proved their foolishness. 

The doctrine commonly called Postmillennialism is, 
strictly understood, both evolutionary and supernatural- 
istic, and has to meet a double set of objections. It holds 
that the preaching of the Gospel under the influence of 
God's Spirit will gradually convert the world and leaven 
society. Thus the kingdom of God, in other words the 



14 The Promise of His Coming 

millennium figuratively understood, is gradually coming 
to earth. When this process has gone on until all men 
have had a full chance to know and believe the Gospel, 
Christ will come and the judgment take place. This final 
coming is more or less realistically conceived according to 
the individual's taste, and there may be very little of the 
supernaturalistic in the doctrine. In any case the king- 
dom is to come by gradual evolution, not by miraculous 
intervention from without. There is little expectation of 
any immediate end of the processes of grace, for it is rec- 
ognized that the world is as yet far from realizing the will 
of God on earth or good will among men. But the leaven 
is spreading. The world is growing better, not worse, 
and the whole creation is moving toward its goal in God. 

The sociologist also looks for the coming of a better 
world by an evolutionary process. Professor Lester F. 
Ward's "famous series of social means and ends" closes 
with "dynamic action," "progress," and "happiness." 1 
Professor Stein of Bern says, 

"The veil is gradually lifting from the meaning of 
history. The meaning is and can be nothing else than 
the progressive ennobling of the human type, the up- 
building of the human species into social persons, the 
final subjugation of the bete humaine through social in- 
stitutions in the realm of law and custom, of religion 
and morality, of art and science/' 2 

In his eighty-ninth year, after an exceedingly active and 
productive life, Alfred Russel Wallace combines a sweep- 
ing criticism of the evils of our present social system with 
a firm faith in the possibility of its complete reformation. 
He writes, 

"Taking account of these various groups of undoubted 
facts, many of which are so gross, so terrible, that they 

x See Small, General Sociology (Chicago, 1905), p. 614; Ward, Dy- 
namic Sociology, vol. ii. p. 108. 

2 An der Wende des Jahrhunderts, p. 441, quoted with full approval 
by Small, op. cit., p. 707. 



The Evolutionary Point of View 15 

cannot be overstated, it is not too much to say that our 
whole system of society is rotten from top to bottom, 
and the Social Environment as a whole, in relation to 
our possibilities and our claims, is the worst that the 
world has ever seen. . . . We have been doing wrong 
for the past century, and we have reaped, and are reap- 
ing 'misery and destruction/ . . . We have ourselves 
created an immoral or unmoral social environment. To 
undo its inevitable results we must reverse our course. 
. . . In this way only can we hope to change our ex- 
isting immoral environment into a moral one, and initi- 
ate a new era of Moral-Progress. . . . The well- 
established laws of evolution as they really apply to man- 
kind are all favorable to the advance of true civilization 
and of morality." 1 

This attitude may be taken as typical of modern science. 
No matter how bad the world is, it will eventually im- 
prove. The idea of evolution has taken such a firm hold 
upon the thinking of all those who devote themselves to 
either physical or social sciences that they never once 
dream of the world's coming to an end until society has 
gone on to develop into higher and higher forms. They 
may recognize the possibility of a sudden, final catastrophe 
by which our world shall cease to harbor life upon it, but 
after studying the process by which through countless 
millions of years the earth has come to be what it is, their 
minds are predisposed to think of the future in terms of 
further countless millenniums of development. The astron- 
omers who were approached by newspaper correspondents 
regarding the catastrophe expected on December 17 apolo- 
gized for even discussing the matter. "All pure non- 
sense," was their verdict. There is but one thing ahead, 
the progressive evolution of human society. 

Liberal theology is likewise evolutionary in its point of 
view. As it looks back upon history it sees the human 

1 Social Environment and Moral Progress (New York, 1913), pp P 
169, 173 f. 



16 The Promise of His Coming 

race in process of development under the divinely consti- 
tuted laws of the universe. As the physical universe 
evolved out of chaos through countless millions of years, 
not six days, so man has gradually evolved out of primi- 
tive bestiality and ignorance, instead of falling from a 
primitive state of purity and reasonableness. A "pro- 
gressive revelation" has kept step with his intellectual, 
moral, and religious progress, or, to put it more accurately, 
experience has slowly taught him new truths about himself, 
the universe, and God, truths which he has registered in 
his social customs, his moral codes, and his religious doc- 
trines. And so he is to grow on indefinitely. In spite 
of all its lapses, the world is not growing worse but better, 
all history being witness thereto. Some have gone so far 
as to maintain that God himself is evolving into a more 
perfect deity. 

Where does "social Christianity" stand? Within the 
last two decades nearly all the leading denominations have 
taken official action expressing themselves on various social 
wrongs. No doubt those who believe the world is growing 
worse might decry the evils of society — as they usually do 
very vociferously — and urge the adoption of Christian 
principles in industrial and commercial relations. But 
no one will deny that the vast majority of Christians who 
have subscribed to the "social creeds of the churches," those 
who have contributed to institutional churches and social 
settlements, and those who have engaged in the multifari- 
ous reform movements of the last century, have believed 
they were hastening the coming of the kingdom by making 
the earth and human society a place where God's will 
could be realized. Social Christianity, usually, if not al- 
ways, expects the coming of the reign of God by evolution, 
not by catastrophe. 

Likewise the missionary impulse is largely due to the 
hope that the world may eventually be won to Christ. 
There are, to be sure, a few who go out to foreign lands 
to preach the Gospel "for a witness" only, hoping to save 



Supernaturalistic Solutions 17 

3ome brands from the burning; but certainly the vast ma- 
jority go to disciple all nations, moved by humanitarian 
principles as much as by evangelical dogma. The follow- 
ing evolutionary reinterpretation of certain apocalyptic 
motifs from Dr. Charles H. Robinson, editorial secretary 
of the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel, signifi- 
cantly illustrates the attitude of most missionaries: 

"Never before in the history of the world has it been 
as literally true as it is at the present moment that there 
is 'upon the earth distress of nations with perplexity, the 
sea and the waves roaring, men's hearts failing them for 
fear and for looking for those things which are coming 
upon the earth/ If in the events which are happening 
around us today we see a partial fulfilment of our Lord's 
prophecy, we can also appropriate to ourselves His words 
of encouragement, 'When these things begin to come to 
pass, look up and lift up your heads, because your re- 
demption draweth nigh/ We are bold to believe that 
the war which now desolates the earth will be the prelude 
to a development of Christian Missions and an expansion 
of the Kingdom of God upon earth that will challenge 
comparison with any which occurred in the apostolic age 
or any subsequent epoch. . . . Modern history will 
date from 1914." 1 

The missionary's point of view is thoroughly hopeful. 
The world is growing better and he solaces himself in 
whatever privations and hardships fall to his lot with the 
faith that he is bringing nearer the reign of Christ over 
the nations. 

III. Supernaturalistic Solutions 

A very considerable number of excellent Christian peo- 
ple believes that the theories which we have just sketched 
are all equally unscriptural and false to the facts of his- 
tory. They hold that the world is not growing better, but 

1 Article in Constructive Quarterly, vol. IV (1916), p. 487, 497, 
"After the War, What?" 



18 The Promise of His Coming 

worse. The Bible teaches that God has no intention of 
saving it by an evolutionary process, but that, at a time 
which he has appointed, he will step in and cut across the 
course of human events as completely as in the story of 
the Flood and start the world off on a new career. We 
may justly refer to these as supernaturalistic solutions of 
the problem of faith. In matters of detail this kind of 
theory presents even a greater variety than the evolution- 
ary. Many who adopt this point of view are still within 
the evangelical denominations. Other groups have formed 
denominations of their own. For distinction's sake we 
may call the former Premillennialists, the latter Advent- 
ists. It is not the present purpose to describe their views 
in detail, but merely to point out their salient features. 

The Seventh-Day Adventists, as perhaps the best known, 
may be selected as typical of all Adventists. Quotations 
from recent writers will illustrate their attitude. 

"A few years ago churchmen taught a future 'church 
triumphant by means of the evangelization of the world. 
From pulpit and press, the twentieth century was her- 
alded as the dawn of perpetual peace and goodwill. The 
'brotherhood of man/ they said, would soon transform 
this world into a land of fellowship and enlightenment. 
But the blind millennial ideas of a few years ago have 
given way to dread of the future. 

"Culture and civilization were unmasked during the 
dark days of the past five years, showing the wickedness 
and corruption in the hearts of men. Imperialism has 
been defeated only to be succeeded by Bolshevism. A 
riot of revolution, anarchy, famine, pestilence, and other 
evils still demonstrates that peace is to be found only in 
righteousness. There is absolutely no hope for the future 
except in the coming of the King triumphant. The world 
is rushing to its doom. Everywhere the elements of de- 
struction are seen. . . . The widespread doctrine 
that in the last days the world will be converted and a 
millennium of righteousness established on the earth is 
a delusion. It is unscriptural and therefore untrue. The 



Supernaturalistic Solutions 19 

earth has almost reached the bed rock of wickedness. 
The deluge of wickedness in antedeluvian days led to 
the deluge of water; and the flood of sin in the world 
that now is, will lead to a deluge of the wrath of God." 1 
"Permanent peace cannot come until the Prince of 
peace establishes the eternal kingdom in which righteous- 
ness holds sway. ... A league of nations is the best 
humanly devised plan ; but laudable as it is, such a league 
will not insure against all future war. . . . Only 
the God of heaven can blot out evil and its hideous train 
of followers." 2 

Another writer quotes "A Declaration of Principles for 
Christian Civic World Reconstruction," distributed by the 
National Reform Association, to the effect that 

"Jesus Christ is King of the nations. His law is the 
rightful law of their existence. Their governments are 
under his authority. 

Civil government is a divine institution, grounded in 
the nature of man, . . . and a principal agency for 
. . . the establishment of the divine kingdom on 
earth." 

After arguing that Jesus is not now recognized as king 
nor is his law obeyed as the "Declaration" claims, this 
writer concludes, 

"To found our hope upon any plan of civic righteous- 
ness is to build our house 'upon the sand/ but not to re- 
pose confidence in the flesh, to look only to Jesus, is to 
build our house 'upon the rock/ This is the secret of 
true reconstruction. May it be, that in the day of God's 
wrath, which will soon break upon the world, we shall 
be found to have got hold of that which will permanently 
endure, and not that which will ingloriously be swept 
away." 3 

1 Signs of the Times, Mountain View, Calif., Sept. 2, 1919, p. 4, 

article by Varner J. Johns, "Harbingers of the Messiah." 

2 Ibid., Aug. 5, 1919, p. 4. 

3 William G. Wirth, "Reconstruction by Civic Righteousness," ibid., 

Aug. 12, 1919, pp. 1, 2, 12. Similar articles may be found in 
almost every number of the periodical. 



20 The Promise of His Coming 

It is quite clear that the Seventh-Day Adventist believes 
that the world is growing worse and is rapidly nearing an 
abyss of wickedness from which only a cataclysmic de- 
struction can rescue it. Not evolution, but retrogression 
describes the course of human history. All our efforts at 
social amelioration and reform are, at best, "laudable" 
only in so far as they save a few individuals, who are 
thus prepared for the great catastrophe which is impend- 
ing. After the cataclysm Christ will reign in a renewed 
and transformed world. He reigns now only in the hearts 
of a few believers. 

The beliefs of militant Premillennialism may best be 
stated by its own representatives. In 1918 a "Bible Con- 
ference" was called by a group which included E. A. Tor- 
rey, W. E. Blackstone, Charles A. Blanchard, L. W. Mun- 
hall, Courtland Meyers, D. H. Stearns, Paul Rader, J. 
Wilbur Chapman, W. H. Griffiths Thomas, C. G. Trum- 
bull, Mark A. Matthews, C. I. Scofield, Len G. Broughten, 
and W. B. Riley. The announcement included the fol- 
lowing statement of faith which was signed by the Chris- 
tian leaders above mentioned : 

"We believe that the Bible is the inerrant, one and 
final Word of God; and, therefore, our only authority. 

We believe in the Deity of our Lord Jesus Christ; 
that he is very God. 

We believe that our Lord's prophetic Word is at this 
moment finding remarkable fulfilment; and that it does 
indicate the nearness of the close of this age, and of the 
coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. 

We believe that the completed church will be trans- 
lated to be forever with the Lord. 

We believe that there will be a gathering of Israel to 
her land in unbelief, and she will afterward be converted 
by the appearance of Christ on her behalf. 

We believe that all human schemes of reconstruction 
must be subsidiary to the coming of our Lord Jesus 
Christy because all nations will be subject to his rule. 

We believe that under the reign of Christ there will 



Super-naturalistic Solutions 21 

be a further great effusion of the Holy Spirit on all flesh. 
We believe that the truths embodied in this statement 
are of the utmost practical importance in determining 
Christian character and action with reference to the 
pressing problems of the hour." 1 

This pronouncement was suggested by a similar call 
which had been issued a few months before by a group of 
English clergymen including G. Campbell Morgan, A. C. 
Dixon, J. Stuart Holden, F. B. Meyer, and Prebendary 
Webb-Peploe. The American manifesto practically cop- 
ied the English premillennial creed, except for the addi- 
tion of the first two points, which no doubt the English 
Premillennialists fully accept, and a somewhat fuller state- 
ment of the third. We have in this platform, then, prac- 
tically a consensus of opinion representing an active group 
to be found in almost every evangelical church in England, 
the United States, and Canada. What are its practical 
implications ? 

The plain inference from these statements is that wars, 
leagues of nations, and all social endeavors are at best of 
subsidiary importance. The year before the war began 
Dr. Torrey wrote in his Return of the Lord Jesus, 

"The writer of this book is an optimist. He is abso- 
lutely sure that a golden age is swiftly coming to this 
earth. But he is not a blind optimist. . . . His 
eyes are wide open to the awful injustices that rule in 
human society as at present constituted. He is fully 
aware that there is a storm coming. He does not ques- 
tion that we are facing the wildest, fiercest, most ap- 
palling storm this world has ever passed through, but 
the storm will be brief and beyond the storm there is a 
golden day, such as philosophers and poets never dreamed 
of. The writer is an optimist because he has deeply pon- 
dered and believes with his whole heart what the Bible 
teaches concerning the Second Coming of Christ. If he 
did not believe that, he could not but be a pessimist, 

1 Quoted from The Christian Work, May 25, 1918, p. 616. The con- 
ference met at Philadelphia in June. 



22 The Promise of His Coming 

knowing what he does of social conditions and the trend 
of human society today. In the Return of our Lord is 
the perfect solution, and the only solution, of the political 
and social and commercial problems that now vex us." 1 

"At the present time, the multiplied iniquities of our 
day, the apostasy into damning error and unbelief of 
many professed and hitherto apparently sincere Chris- 
tians, and of many professedly evangelical preachers, and 
of numerous professors of theology in seminaries built 
at great sacrifice by orthodox men and women for the 
promulgation of truth and not for the breeding of error, 
the increase of lawlessness on the part of the great corpo- 
rations on the one hand and on the part of the oppressed 
poor on the other, the mutterings preceding the storm 
of wild anarchy that seems likely soon to break, all 
these things are signs of His coming, which may be very 
near at hand. . . . The darker the day grows, the 
nearer at hand is the dawn, and just at the moment when 
things seem unendurable, the brightest, gladdest day the 
earth ever saw is breaking." 2 

J. Stuart Holden believes the war has proved the truth 
of the premillennial philosophy of history. He says, 

"War has come to many as the flat contradiction of 
their theories and hopes that the world was getting bet- 
ter, that the Spirit of God was in some way laying hold 
of civilizations and governments, and that the Kingdom 
of God was already being set up by human hands and 
was coming by observation. And yet there are still 
those who hold to such ideas with pathetic obsession. In 
earlier days they pointed to the growth of international 
amity, the development of social conscience, and the per- 
meation of universal concerns by the principles of right- 
eousness, as affording strong justification for the belief 
that the world would grow better and better under the 
influences of the Church's work, until finally Christ 
should come back to reign over a people altogether pre- 
pared for His rule. How this contention can still be 

1 Pp. 7 f. 

2 Ibid., pp. 108 f. 



Supernaturalistic Solutions 23 

maintained passes my comprehension. War, that great 
revealer of nations, has come in its most hideous forms to 
demonstrate the falsity of assumptions which never found 
support in the word of God." 1 

Dr. S. D. Gordon "calls to mind the keen lines" of 
Cliilde Harold's Pilgrimage, as expressing his own judg- 
ment of human progress : 

"Here is the moral of all human tales; 
^Tis but the same rehearsal of the past, 
First Freedom, and the Glory — when that fails, 
Wealth, vice, corruption — barbarism at last. 
And History with all her volumes vast 
Hath but one page !" 2 

In the premillennial view, then, what was the signifi- 
cance of the war just ended ? Dr. Gordon may be taken 
as expressing the consensus of opinion. He says in his 
recent Quiet Talks on the Deeper Meaning of the War and 
its Relation to Our Lord's Return, 

"This then is the first part of the answer as to the sig- 
nificance of the war. It was Satan's latest attempt to 
work out his unholy ambition on the earth. This is 
fundamental. It strikes at the very root. But it does 
not cover all the ground. . . . 

"The Book . . . says repeatedly that the return 
of Christ will be preceded by a crisis. . . . And this 
gives the clue to the further significance of this upheaval. 
The characteristics of the whole run of time from Christ's 
utterance up to this terrific climax, are clearly stated. 
Wars, rumors of wars, famines, pestilences, earthquakes, 
false religious teachers, defection in the Church — these 
have been common to every generation. 

"This war has witnessed the fiercest intensifying of 
some of these characteristics since Christ talked of them 
on Olivet. . . . The very stupendousness of it natu- 
rally suggests a working up toward a climax. This seems 
to give the second part of the answer as to the war's sig- 

1 Will The Christ Return? (New York, 1918), pp. 16 f. 
2 Quiet Talks on the Deeper Meaning of the War, p. 81. 



24 The Promise of His Coming 

nificance. It seems like a stiffened index finger pointing 
straight toward such a crisis as the Book says goes before 
the return of Christ, and the consequent change in the 
order of things. . . . 

"And, I want to say very thoughtfully this, a venture- 
some thing to risk one's judgment upon, this: it is a 
working possibility that this will occur in our generation. 
. . . I might say a working probability. I do say 
that to myself/' 1 

To the Premillennialist the war, then, is not a great 
victory of the forces of idealism and democracy over a 
materialistic theory of social evolution and a reactionary 
autocracy. It does not mark a step forward in the history 
of nations. The revolutions in Russia, Germany, and 
Austria are not three great strides forward in the over- 
throw of despotism and the enthronement of the people. 
It is not a triumph of international law, international hon 
esty, and civilization over Machiavellian diplomacy and 
ruthless barbarism. Its real significance is that the world 
is growing worse. "It is the world's greatest crisis point- 
ing to a yet greater." 2 Is it an injustice to the English 
and American signers of the manifestos we have named to 
say that their words seem to imply that it was useless to 
spend treasure and blood to win the war ? 

What of the League of Nations ? "All human schemes 
of reconstruction must be subsidiary to the coming of our 
Lord Jesus Christ, because all nations will be subject to 
his rule. . . . The truths embodied in this statement 
are of the utmost practical importance in determining 
Christian character and action with reference to the press- 
ing problems of the hour." Have we any duty then with 
regard to the League of Nations ? As one of the signs of 
the final "crisis" Dr. Gordon mentions a coalition of Euro- 
pean or world powers as "the world situation." That is 
one thing that "can be stated positively." He continues, 

1 Pp. 62, 66 f., 69. 

2 Gordon, op. cit., p. 71. 



Supernaturalistic Solutions 25 

"There's a second thing that is quite clear to every- 
body. There will be a new map of Europe at the signing 
of the peace treaty, the technical end of the war. There 
will be a wholly new world situation. And it is a possi- 
bility that that new world situation may shift, gradually 
and yet swiftly, into that five-featured world situation of 
the crisis, the transition crisis that goes before the return 
of Christ and the new order of things." 1 

"This is one most striking thing. It awes the student 
of God's Word. The spirit of coalition among the na- 
tions was never so strong nor so near some sort of reali- 
zation. The world situation seen in the Bible at the 
crisis time is not a coalition of all nations. It is simply 
a ten-kingdomed coalition or confederacy, later an eight- 
kingdomed, and it centers in Europe and at the Mediter- 
ranean." 2 

Likewise Dr. C. I. Schofield says that no peace will 
come as a result of the great war. The League of Nations 
seems to be the federated world-empire headed by the little 
horn of Daniel, the man of sin of Paul, the beast out of the 
sea of Revelation. 3 

In other words, the spread of international amity, the 
elimination of causes of international jealousy, and the 
development of the machinery for promoting universal 
goodwill have no value in realizing the will of God or the 
message of a Gospel of love, but are merely signs of the 
coming catastrophe by which alone God can come to reign 
in the world. 

The manifestos containing the words we have repeated 
above were both issued at a time when men were beginning 
to look forward to the period of reconstruction following 
the war. Are they not clearly intended to say that no re- 
construction of any fundamental and permanent value can 
be achieved? Premillennialists are fully agreed on these 
points: The war and the social wrongs and unrest every- 

1 Quiet Talks on the Deeper Meaning of the War, pp. 68 f. 

2 Op. cit. } 273 f., cp. pp. 82, 218, 260, 271-274. 
8 What Do the Prophets Say? p. 18 f. 



26 The Promise of His Corning 

where in evidence are signs of the evil times that must 
immediately precede the great turn in the affairs of the 
world when Christ shall return. The world is destined to 
grow worse and worse and even the efforts which may be 
made to prevent wars and other great social evils are 
merely proofs that we are nearing the limit of human 
ingenuity and that God must soon intervene and by a 
great catastrophe punish and destroy the evil in the world 
and miraculously make it over into the millennial realm 
which the returned Christ shall rule. 

IV. The Study of Eschatology 

We have mentioned the growth of popular interest in 
the second advent before the war. This was equalled, if 
not surpassed, by the attention paid by historical students 
of Christian origins to the problem of eschatology, the 
question as to the end of the world and what should follow 
it. In the winter of 1913-14 a qualified observer wrote, 

"The eschatological question, if not the most difficult 
and disturbing, is at any rate the most living issue in 
New Testament criticism and at the present time attracts 
more general interest than any other subject connected 
with biblical studies." 1 

The reasons for this interest were various. First of 
all the discovery of much new material and the study and 
reinterpretation of old bearing upon the Jewish beliefs as 
to the coming of the kingdom have placed in the student's 
hands the means for an entirely new understanding of the 
teachings of the Old and New Testament on the subject. 2 
In the second place, the subject was forced to the fore- 

1 Maurice Jones, The New Testament in the Twentieth Century (Lon- 
don, 1914), p. 87. 

3 Especially the numerous editions from the hand of Dr. R. H. 
Charles, culminating in his Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha of 
the Old Testament in English, 2 vols., Oxford, 1913. Also his 
Eschatology, Hebrew, Jewish, and Christian, London, 1899. See 
his monumental commentary in the International Critical series 
(New York. 1920). Rendell Harris, M. R. James, and W. 0. E. 
Oesterley, among others, deserve mention. 



The Study of Eschatologij 27 

front by the revolt of certain German students of the life 
of Christ against the superficial, inadequate, and unhis- 
torical modernization of the figure of Jesus which had be- 
come the fashion in certain German "liberal" circles. An 
effort to get back to the real Jesus and interpret him in his 
historical milieu immediately raised the question as to 
what he meant by his references to his own future and the 
coming of the kingdom of God. 

The liberal portrait of Jesus had achieved a wide vogue. 
There was a scholarly consensus of opinion as to the main 
outlines of Jesus' life. The attempt to answer the escha- 
tological question issued in two contradictory conclusions. 
Wrede declared that Jesus never regarded himself as the 
messiah; the references to his place in the kingdom had 
been read back into his teaching by the apostles, who after 
his death came to the view announced in the gospels. 
Jesus, was only a pre-eminent Jewish prophet, who died 
for his fidelity to his message. 1 

Schweitzer came to just the opposite conclusion: Jesus' 
belief that he was the messiah and messiah in the trans- 
cendental, supernaturalistic sense, was the center of his 
conduct, the key to unlock the mystery of his life and 
death. The language Jesus used is not to be toned down 
or explained away. He meant what he said and died in 
the full faith that he would shortly return on the clouds 
of heaven, believing that by going through this great 
"affliction" he was making it possible for the kingdom to 
come. 2 



1 Wilhelm Wrede (1859-1906, professor of evangelical theology in 

Breslau from 1893), Das Messiasgeheimnis in den Evangelien. 
Gottingen, 1901. 

2 Albert Schweitzer, Mystery of the Kingdom: The Secret of Jesus 1 

Messiahship and Passion. Translated with an Introduction by 
Walter Lowrie, New York, 1914; The Quest of the Historical 
Jesus: A Critical Study of its Progress from Reimarus to 
Wrede. Translated by W. Montgomery, with a preface by F. C. 
Burkitt. London, 1910. Born 1875, became Privat-Dozent in 
New Testament studies at the University of Strassburg in 1902. 
Later studied medicine; in 1913 went to the Congo as a medical 
missionary, referring to his work as "practical eschatology." 



28 The Promise of His Coming 

Wrede's method carried almost to the limit the liberal 
principle of eliminating from the records what appears to 
the modern investigator inconsistent or out of place. 1 
Schweitzer, on the contrary, claims to conserve practically 
all the synoptic gospels, to read little or nothing between 
the lines, and to accept the plain meaning of the evan- 
gelists' language as interpreted by contemporary History 
and literature. Wrede's Messianic Secret (Messiasge- 
heimnis), which appeared on the same day as Schweitzer's 
Mystery of the Kingdom (Das Messianitats-und Leidens- 
geheimnis), made few converts. Quite naturally some 
"liberals" were ready to follow their accepted principles 
a step farther. But the great majority of New Testament 
scholars had been prepared by familiarity with Jewish 
apocalyptic literature to be deeply influenced by Schweit- 
zer, whose learning, brilliance, and evident piety could not 
but make a profound impression. 

An illustration of this impression and its serious import 
is the last work of the talented Irish Modernist, Father 
Tyrrell, the manuscript of which lay open on his desk and 
hardly finished when he laid down his facile pen forever. 
The very title, Christianity at the Cross Roads? shows how 
deeply the eminent Catholic, true to the last to the "idea" 
of the church which had disowned him, felt the signifi- 
cance of the eschatological question. It involved the whole 
Christian view of the universe. Are life and history and 
society the products of a purely mechanical evolution, 
which God may or may not have started, or may we still 
believe in the supernatural? Is God only a potency im- 
minent in a pantheistic sense, or is he also a transcendant 
being, a real personality, who in some fashion comes into 
communion with man and affects man's feeling and do- 
ing? If the latter, how is he working in the world and 

^■Only Drews and the other proponents of the Christ-myth theory 

have gone farther. 
2 London, 1910. 



The Study of Eschatology 29 

what will be the outcome? Christianity, in facing the 
eschatological question, is at the cross roads. 

Where are we to class Jesus? Christianity cannot be 
maintained on the foundation of a Christ who is merely 
an "idea," despite much specious reasoning to prove that 
the historical Jesus is of no importance. But the Jesus 
of history was a Jew, and after Schweitzer no one can 
study him and ignore the eschatological materials in the 
gospels. Jesus said, "Ye shall all see the Son of man 
. . . coming on the clouds of heaven." What manner 
of man was Jesus ? When and how is he coming ? May 
we talk of social teachings of Jesus, or were his ethical 
standards' only intended to apply to a brief interval before 
the new kingdom should break upon the world out of the 
skies? Was his death merely a sacrifice to his mistaken 
idea of his messiahship, or has it some real value in saving 
man and society ? Was Jesus merely a mistaken enthusi- 
ast, or have his teachings on questions of eschatology to 
be taken as they stand ? In other words, does Schweitzer 
really drive us either to reject Jesus as Lord and Master, 
or to accept his eschatological program as the Premillen- 
nialist interprets it? Every question, theoretical and 
practical, with which modern Christianity is concerned 
must be answered according to our understanding of Jesus' 
messiahship and second coming. How are we to inter- 
pret it? 

The path toward a solution must lie through historical 
study. We cannot interpret the gospels without a knowl- 
edge of Greek. Much more we cannot interpret Jesus 
without a knowledge of the thought world of the people to 
whom he spoke. As the history of the United States 
would be a riddle to one who knew nothing of the War of 
Independence, so the Jews are a riddle to one who knows 
nothing of their national hope. It is to the study of this, 
then, that we turn as manifestly the first step toward a 
solution of the problem of the coming of the Kingdom and 



30 The Promise of His Coming 

the King. As we follow it through the centuries we shall 
find our way to firmer ground for the understanding and 
appreciation of Jesus and his message. 



CHAPTEE II 
THE DAY OF YAHWEH 

I. The Foundation of the Hebrew National Hope 

THE hope of the early Hebrews centered around the 
"Day of Jehovah/' or Yahweh, 1 the Hebrew equiva- 
lent of the second coming and the day of judgment. Its 
earliest mention in their literature is found in Amos. Al- 
though the first of the long line of Hebrew prophets whose 
addresses have been preserved, he is evidently using a 
term that is already quite familiar to his hearers. He 
says, 

"Woe unto you that desire the day of Yahweh! 
Wherefore would ye have the day of Yahweh? It is 
darkness, and not light. As if a man did flee from a lion, 
and a bear met him ; or went into the house and leaned 
his hand on the wall, and a serpent bit him. Shall not 
the day of Yahweh be darkness, and not light ? even very 
dark, and no brightness in it? 

"Woe to them that are at ease in Zion, and to them 
that are secure in the mountain of Samaria, the notable 
men of the chief of the nations, to whom the house of 
Israel come! ... ye that put far away the evil 
day, and cause the seat of violence to come near." 2 

He can even speak of "that day" as perfectly well 
known, where nothing in the context explains it. 3 

1 The word "Jehovah" is a hybrid, arising from a misunderstanding. 

The word ' 'Yahweh," which more nearly corresponds to the 
original Hebrew name, is preferable; cp. Bad£, The Old Testa- 
ment in the Light of Today (Boston, 1915), pp. 313 f. 

2 Amos 5:18 If.; 6:1, 3. 
8 Amos 2:16; 8:9, 13. 

31 



32 The Promise of His Coming 

From Amos' words it is plain that the people he was 
addressing had a definite conception of what the day of 
Yahweh would mean to them. Some of them, probably 
the great majority, thought "that day" would mean glory 
to Israel, and desired that it might come as speedily as 
possible. Others, possibly half convinced by Amos or hi3 
predecessors, that it would mean darkness and not light, 
persuaded themselves that that day was as yet far off, 
and at present they had nothing to fear. 1 

The tone and content of the teachings of Amos and of 
all his successors make it plain that the prophetic concep- 
tion of the day of Yahweh was quite at variance with that 
of the people. 2 The outcome of this conflict of ideas was 
eventually handed down to Jesus and his disciples, and 
upon it the Christian hope of the kingdom of God is based. 
Therefore, before attempting to interpret the prophetic 
conception, or the Jewish and Christian ideals which grew 
out of it, we must notice the views which we find already 
occupying the minds of the people- when Amos began to 
preach. We are working somewhat in the dark because 
of the lack of direct evidence ; yet the course of early He- 
brew religious development is sufficiently clear to give us 
all we need — the broad outlines of the foundation of that 
national hope which was all-important for the later edifice 
of Hebrew thinking. 

The Hebrew's fundamental assumption was Yahweh's 
loving care for his people. According to the popular be- 
lief in the times of the "judges" and the early monarchy, 
Israel was the chosen people of Yahweh. Deborah sings 
"praise to Yahweh, the God of Israel," for "the righteous 



x Note another attitude in Is. 5:18 f. 

2 See Harper, "International Critical Commentary," Amos and Hosea 
(New York, 1905), pp. cx-cxx and on Amos 5:18; Marti, 
Dodekapropheton (Tubingen, 1904), ad loc, and Geschichte der 
Israel, Religion, 4th ed., pp. 180-186, 5th ed., 1907, pp. 200-20G. 
As it appears to me, Oesterley, Evolution of the Messianic Idea 
(New York, 1908), pp. 241-248, goes too far in contrasting the 
popular and the prophetic point of view. 



The Hebrew National Hope 33 

acts of his rule in Israel/' when "the people of Yahweh 
went down to the gates." 1 The earliest Hebrew traditions 
tell how God had chosen Abraham and made a cove- 
nant with him. He had saved the patriarch's descendants 
from Egypt ; he had led them through the wilderness ; had 
given them a place in Canaan — to the desert nomad a "land 
flowing with milk and honey," and, finally, he had deliv- 
ered them from their once more powerful neighbors, and 
had made them for a time the greatest nation within their 
political horizon. Their traditions, as narrated by the 
first historians whose work is preserved, those of the ninth 
and eighth centuries, 2 exhibit the completest confidence 
in Yahweh's power and in his love for the people whom 
he had chosen; and, therefore, in the continued prosper- 
ity of the nation ; for how could Yahweh vindicate himself 
and his choice, except by making them more powerful and 
glorious ? 3 

While the power and prestige of Israel had suffered 
grievously in the generations following the division of the 
kingdom, just before Amos' time there had come the In- 
dian summer of her glory, when very much of her former 
wealth and prosperity had been restored under the fortu- 
nate reigns of Jeroboam II in the northern kingdom and 
Uzziah in Judah. Hosea and Amos, dissatisfied as they 
were with social conditions in Israel, had no doubt that 
their people had been the special favorite of Yahweh. They 
hear Yahweh say, 

"When Israel was a child, then I loved him, and called 
my son out of Egypt. ... I taught Ephraim to 
walk; I took them on my arms." 4 



1 Jud. 5:3, 5, 11. See Bad£, op. cit., pp. 55 ff. 

2 The so-called J and E documents ; see Driver, Introduction to the 

Literature of the Old Testament, new ed., pp. 116-126; Gray, 
Critical Introduction to the Old Testament (London, 1913), 
pp. 37 f. 

8 Cp. H. P. Smith, Religion of Israel (New York, 1914), p. 44. 

*Hos. 11:1-3. 



34 The Promise of His Coming 

"You only have I known of all the families of the 
earth." 1 

The closing section of the "Book of the Covenant" accu- 
rately expresses the popular trust. Yahweh says in the 
ear of Israel, 

"If thou shalt indeed ... do all that I speak; 
then I will be an enemy unto thine enemies, and an ad- 
versary unto thine adversaries. For mine angel shall go 
before thee." 2 

Yahweh's choice involved Israel's mission. The mod- 
ern missionary spirit, one of the noblest expressions of 
Christian altruism, finds a startling parallel, if not its ori- 
gin, in a feeling that seems to have been common to all 
Israel's neighbors, the conviction that each nation was 
bound to 

"extend the influence of its own particular god to the 
farthest possible limit, . . . hence wars of conquest, 
which were at the same time religious wars, were of un- 
ceasing occurrence. . . . Every (Assyrian) king in 
every campaign declares himself to have been incited, 
emboldened and prospered by his nation's gods. . . . 
Esarhaddon, for example, well expresses the animating 
spirit of Assyrian warfare thus : The names of the great 
gods they invoked together and trusted in their power. 
I, however, trusted in Ashur, my lord, and like a bird 
out of the mountains I captured him and cut off his head. 
In order to exhibit the might of Ashur, my lord, before 
the eyes of the peoples, I hung the heads of Sanduarri and 
Abdimilkuti upon the necks of their great men/ " 3 

Israel felt with unexampled keenness the pressure of 
this divine ambition. The Hebrew believed that other 
gods existed; hence, only by conquest of the nations that 
served them could Yahweh's superiority be shown. The 

1 Am. 3:2. 

2 YjX. 23:22 f. 

8 J. M. P. Smith, Am. Journal of Theol., V (1901), 506. 



The Hebrew National Hope 35 

occupation of Canaan had been a partial fulfilment of 
this duty. Once, for two generations, the house of David, 
the man after God's own heart, had further discharged 
this patriotic-religious obligation. If, since then, the 
nation had fallen on evil ways, there must arise a new 
David who would far outshine the first one in devotion 
to Yahw r eh and in achieving world-wide renown in his 
name. 

The patriotism of the earliest prophets partakes of this 
spirit. Practically all the prophets, from the time of 
Samuel and the "schools" of his day down to Amos, were 
the friends and confidential advisers of the reigning 
monarchs, either in Judah or in Israel. Such were Gad 
and Nathan to David. Such was Ahijah, whose relation 
to Jeroboam and his revolt is an interesting illustration 
of the political activities of the prophets. For a time 
Ahab's desertion of Israel's religion brings him and his 
dynasty into conflict with the prophets, led by Elijah and 
Elisha. When, under Jehu, the revolution which Elisha 
had planned succeeded, we find the prophets backing the 
government again. The story of Joash' visit to Elisha 
on his deathbed shows the prophet as deeply concerned 
for the victory of his country's armies as any modern 
fighting parson could be. 1 The watchword of such a 
prophet as Elisha was not, "My country, right or wrong," 
but "My country cannot be wrong." It was in this spirit 
that the prophets of the ninth and eighth centuries rewrote 
the myths and legends of their race and the history of 
their country. All was reinterpreted in the light of their 
belief that right would eventually reign in the triumph 
of the Hebrew nation over all its enemies and its conquest 
of all the lands of the earth. The conception which these 
prophetic chroniclers had of Israel's history is revealed 
by two or three verses which tell of the victories of the 
son of Joash, Jeroboam II. 

l H Kgs. 13:14-19. 



36 The Promise of His Coming 

"He restored the border of Israel from the entrance of 
Hamath unto the sea of the Arabah, according to the 
word of Yahweh, the God of Israel, which he spake by 
his servant Jonah the son of Amittai, the prophet, who 
was of Gath-hepher. For Yahweh saw the affliction of 
Israel, that it was very bitter; for there was none shut 
up nor left at large, neither was there any helper for 
Israel. And Yahweh said not that he would blot out the 
name of Israel from under heaven; but he saved them 
. by the hand of Jeroboam the son of Joash/ n 

In the southern kingdom the prophets record the preva- 
lent faith that the Davidic line would never cease to reign 
and thus give the initial impulse to the conception of the 
Davidic messiah. 2 Indeed all through the history from 
Samuel to Amos we see religion and patriotism going 
hand in hand. The two recorded outbursts of prophetic 
"enthusiasm/ 5 in the times of Samuel and Elisha, seem 
intentionally to have combined religious and patriotic fer- 
vor. In fact, the worship of Yahweh was the one common 
bond between the tribes. The prophets before Amos con- 
tinually preached Israel's duty to serve Yahweh, and they 
were enriching the idea of service with ethical content, 
but they were equally emphatic in proclaiming the promise 
of Yahweh to bless the nation in return. 

This feeling of confidence, born of Israel's history, her 
sense of mission, and her religious instruction, crystallized 
into the idea of Yahweh's covenant with his people. While 
this was not thought of as a commercial contract between 
two more or less equal parties, but rather like the terms 
imposed upon a weaker by a benevolent stronger nation, 
yet it involved mutual rights and obligations. 3 One of 
our earliest records of this covenant idea is found in Ex- 
odus 34:10 ff. Yahweh said, 

1 II Kgs. 14:25-27. Cp. Buttenwieser, The Prophets of Israel (New 

York, 1914), pp. 238 f. 
2 II Sam. 7:12-17. 
s See Robinson, Religious Ideas of the Old Testament (New York, 

1913), pp. 186-190. 



The Hebrew National Hope 37 

"Behold, I make a covenant: before all thy people I 
will do marvels, such as have not been wrought in all the 
earth, nor in any nation ; and all the people among which 
thou art shall see the work of Yahweh ; for it is a terrible 
thing that I do with thee. Observe thou that which I 
command thee this day: behold, I drive out before thee 
the Amorite, the Canaanite, etc." 1 

Then follow the original "ten commandments" which de- 
fined Israel's obligations to Yahweh. God required of his 
people worship — sacrifices and offerings — and a certain 
elementary morality. He promised to do a most astonish- 
ing thing — to give that little band of nomads the land of 
the Canaanites. He had already covenanted with Abra- 
ham to make his seed a great nation, as numerous as the 
stars of Heaven. 2 Later he made a covenant with David 
to establish his throne forever. 3 According to the Book 
of Jeremiah, God established an indissoluble covenant 
with David, his servant, and with the priests the Levites, 
Yahweh's ministers. 4 Down to the time of Jesus and 
beyond, this confidence persisted unabated. In the Psalms 
of Solomon we read, 

"For Thou didst choose the seed of Abraham before 
all the nations, 
And didst set Thy name upon us, Lord, 
And Thou wilt not reject us for ever. 
Thou madest a covenant with our father concerning 
us; 
And we hope in Thee." 5 

Paul could not believe that God had cast off his people. 
Hence arises the modern idea that the Jews must be con- 
verted before the millennium comes. 

1 See also v. 27 f. and 24:1-8. 

2 Gen. 15:5-18, from JE. 

3 II Sam. 7:8-16. Driver thinks this substantially pre-Deuteronomic, 

c. 700 B. C, Introduction, p. 183. 
*Jer. 31:35-37; 33:20-22. 
6 9:17 ff., dating from the first century B. C. 



38 The Promise of His Coming 

Israel's future, therefore, was assured. So long as the 
nation was uniformly, or usually, prosperous, no doubts 
or fears arose to trouble the pious mind. The suffering 
of the individual and his relation to Yahweh were not 
matters of concern. Personal religion, as we conceive 
it, was practically unknown. The individual was but a 
part of the group, a cell in the social organism. Only the 
nation was of moment. Israel's prosperity was evidence 
at once of Yahweh' s power and his favor. Even if re- 
verses came to their armies, or famines, earthquakes, or 
other "acts of God" brought loss, they were but signs that 
Yahweh was temporarily displeased, owing to some neglect 
of his ritual or infringement of his prerogatives. 1 Yah- 
weh could not think of breaking his covenant, for, if he 
should, he would be without worshippers. Princes and 
people were convinced that they could "lean upon Yahweh, 
and say, Is not Yahweh in the midst of us ? no evil shall 
come upon us." 2 If at any time Israel did not seem 
to be fulfilling her lofty mission, then Yahweh would 
surely intervene to vindicate himself and the people whom 
he had chosen, as tradition told them he had done in the 
past. 3 To the popular mind the "day of Yahweh" meant 
this time of visitation and vindication, when he would 
punish Israel's enemies and reveal himself as the might- 
iest of gods by making his people the greatest of nations. 
Jeremiah describes Judah as languishing from drought 
and praying to Yahweh in her anguish, 

"Though our iniquities testify against us, work thou 
for thy name's sake, Yahweh ; for our backslidings are 
many; we have sinned against thee. thou hope of 
Israel, the Savior thereof in the time of trouble, why 
shouldest thou be as a sojourner in the land? . . . 

x See Josh. 7; II Sam. 21:24. 

2 Mic. 3:11. 

3 The hopefulness of the popular faith is revealed in such passages 
as the "Blessing of Jacob/' Gen. 49 (1000-900 B. C), the 
"Oracles of Balaam," Num. 23-24 (1000-800 B. C), and the 
"Blessing of Moses/' Dt. 33 (780 B. C). 



Popular Theology 39 

Yet thou, Yahweh, art in the midst of us, and we are 
called by thy name; leave us not." 1 

The foundation, then, of the Hebrew national hope was 
a firm faith in the inseparable relation between Israel and 
Yahweh. He was their God, they were his people. For 
his own name's sake he must make them a great nation. 



II. Popular Theology and the Day of Yahweh 

The Hebrew national hope involved, then, two ideas: 
(1) the day of Yahweh, when he should manifest and 
vindicate himself and them, and (2) the new era that 
should follow. What was the popular idea as to the nature 
of this self-manifestation and what was the origin of the 
conception? The answer to this double question is diffi- 
cult, because, in the first place, we have no records of the 
popular conceptions that preceded the writing prophets; 
in the second, because we are not sure of the integrity 
of most of the prophetic books that have come down to 
us; and, in the third, because we cannot tell how much 
of the prophetic language is to be taken literally and how 
much figuratively. However, the comparative study of 
religions, particularly among Israel's neighbors, throws 
light on our problem. Conceptions familiar in near-by 
countries and mentioned in Hebrew literature were prob- 
ably popular among the Hebrews. 2 Again, we may feel 
fairly sure that, where the prophets seem to take ideas 
for granted, or to use expressions as if common, they have 
adopted them from the national stock of tradition. And, 
finally, it does not matter for our present purpose whether 
we can determine within a century or two the date of a 
given passage. In any case, there is little difference of 
opinion as to the dates of the threatening oracles, those 
that have to do with the day of Yahweh. 

1 Jer. 14:7-9. See Buttenwieser, Prophets of Israel, pp. 184 ff. 

3 See below, sec. III. See Oesterley, Messianic Idea, esp. pp. 37-40. 



40 The Promise of His Coming 

The foundation, then, of the Hebrew national hope we 
have found in the national theology, in the prevalent con- 
ception of the relation of Yahweh to his people. The 
sources of its content, of the bizarre and complicated ideas 
which clothed and gave form to it, are to be sought partly 
in theology, partly in mythology. 

The term "day of Yahweh" 1 is an example of the con- 
creteness with which the Hebrew was accustomed to ex- 
press himself. Instead of speaking of future rewards and 
punishments, of Yahweh's future manifestation of him- 
self, he puts all these ideas into a short pictorial phrase. 
Its closest analogy seems to be the use of "day of" with 
a local proper name to indicate a day of battle, or of some 
signal disaster or judgment which occurs at the place 
mentioned, a use also found in Arabic. Thus we read 
of the "'days of Gibeah," 2 the "day of Jerusalem," 3 the 
"day of Egypt," 4 the "day of Midian." 5 Equivalent 
expressions are "that day," 6 "those days," 7 "that time," 8 
"the day," 9 and "in those days and at that time." 10 "In 
the latter days" 11 is usually connected with the hope of 
future happiness. Often predictions begin with "Lo, the 
days come," 12 which conveys the same idea. Perhaps its 
content is best seen in such expression as, 



x See Kobinson, Religious Ideas of the OT> pp. 190-193; J. M. P. 

Smith, article "Day of Yahweh" in Am. Journal of Theol. V 

(1901) 505-533; Oesterley, Messianic Idea, pp. 240-252. 
2 Hos. 10:9. 
3 Ps. 137:7. 
*Ez. 30:9. 
5 Is. 9:4. The "day of Jezreel," Hos. 1:11, according to Harper, 

"Int. Crit. Com.", Hosea, ad loc., means the "day of sowing." 
6 Is. 2:11; 17:4, 7; 30:23; Jer. 4:9; Hos. 2:18; Joel 3:18; Am. 2:16; 

Mic. 2:4; 5:10; Hag. 2:23; Zech. 9:16; 13:1; 14:4, 6, 9. 
7 Jer. 31:33; 33:15; Zech. 8:23; Joel 3:1. 
8 Jer. 4:11; 31:1; Zeph. 3:19, 20. 
9 Ez. 7:10, 12. 

10 Jer. 33:15; Joel 3:1. 

11 Gen. 49:1; Dt. 4:30; Is. 2:2=Mic. 4:1; Hos. 3:5. 

12 Jer. 23:5, 7; 31:27, 31, 38; 33:14. 



Popular Theology 41 

"Yahweh of hosts hath a day upon all that is proud 
and haughty." 1 

"Yahweh hath a day of vengeance, a year of recom- 
pense for the cause of Zion." 2 

It was inevitable that the nature of the manifestation 
of Yahweh on that supreme "day," when he was to come 
to vindicate himself and his people, should be determined 
by the prevailing conception of Yahweh's character. What- 
ever the source of the idea, 3 Yahweh was generally re- 
garded as a war god. 

"He is spoken of as a 'man of war/ 4 An early collection 
of songs was called 'The Book of Wars of Yahweh/ 5 Israel's 
enemies were his enemies; 6 Israel's wars were his wars; 7 
Israel's armies were his armies. 8 The title ^Yahweh of hosts' 
was interpreted as meaning 'God of the armies of Israel/ " 9 
So also occasionally the sword of Yahweh is mentioned. 10 He 
will "whet the lightning of his sword." 11 "The Assyrian shall 
fall by the sword, not of man; and the sword, not of men, 
shall devour him." 12 As Professor J. M. P. Smith says, 

"The popular conception of the Day of Yahweh was, 
in short, that of a great day of battle on which Yahweh 
would place himself at the head of the armies of Israel 



^s. 2:12 mg. 

2 Is. 34:8. 

3 See Gressmann, Ursprung der israelitisch-jiidischen Eschatologie 

(Gottingen, 1905), pp. 71-76; EDB II 202 f., Ill 137 f. 

4 Ex. 15:3. 

5 Num. 21:14. 

9 1 Sam. 30:26. 

7 Ex. 17:35 f.; Jud. 5:25; I Sam. 18:17; 25:28. 
3 1 Sam. 17:26, 36. 

9 1 Sam. 17:45. Knudson, Religious Teachings of the Old Testament 
(New York, 1918), p. 116 f. 

10 Jos. 5:13; Zeph. 2:12; Jer. 25:31; 47:6; 50:35 ff.; Is. 34:5; 

66:16; Ez. 21:3 f., 8 ff., 14; 32:10; Ps. 7:12; cp. Gen. 3:24. 
See Gressmann, Ursprung, pp. 76-82, and below, p. 51. 

11 Dt. 32:41, mg. 
"Is. 31:8. 



42 The Promise of His Coming 

and lead them on to overwhelming victory over all their 
enemies/* 1 

In the beginning, however, Yahweh seems to have 
been a god, not of war, but of nature. 2 The earliest 
descriptions we have of his activities connect him with 
nature in her more terrible moods. In that primitive 
piece of Hebrew literature, the Song of Deborah, the 
coming of Yahweh to the aid of his people is thus de- 
scribed : 

"Yahweh, when thou wentest forth out of Seir, 
When thou marchedst out of the field of Edom, 
The earth trembled, the heavens also dropped, 
Yea, the clouds dropped water. 
The mountains quaked at the presence of Yahweh, 
Even yon Sinai at the presence of Yahweh, the God 
of Israel/* 3 

The theophany at Sinai, according to tradition his fun- 
damental, determinative manifestation to Israel, was 
either that of a storm god, or a volcanic deity, master of 
fire and earthquake. 4 Hebrew history shows that Yah- 
weh was thought of as withholding or sending rains and 
fruitful seasons, as raining fire from Heaven, as sending 
plagues, in fact, as having all the processes of nature in 
his hands, and this, long before monotheism made him the 
one almighty ruler of the universe. 

Accordingly the day of Yahweh involved mighty natu- 
ral catastrophes. Yahweh "fought for Israel with storm, 
hail, thunderstorm, earthquake, fire, and pestilence, or, 
in other words, Yahweh is war god only in so far as he 
is nature god/' 5 The two conceptions were combined in 
Hebrew thought. Inasmuch as the passages which refer 
to Yahweh as God of nature are the earlier and the more 



1 "The Day of Yahweh/' Am. Journal of Theol. V (1901), 512. 

2 Gressmann, Ur sprung, pp. 8-70. 
3 Jud. 5:4 f. 

4 Gressmann argues for the latter interpretation, op. eit., pp. 40-49. 

5 Gressmann, Ursprung, p. 76. 



Popular Theology 43 

numerous, it is only natural to infer that from prehis- 
toric times the Day of Yahweh was thought of as a 
time of natural convulsions and that the idea of warfare 
was secondary. 

The final manifestation of Yahweh is described by 
every prophet with traits drawn from great natural ca- 
tastrophes. 

"I will kindle a fire in the wall of Kabbah, and it shall 
devour the palaces thereof, with shouting in the day of 
battle, with a tempest in the day of the whirlwind. . . . 
And flight shall perish from the swift; and the strong 
shall not strengthen his force; neither shall the mighty 
deliver himself, . . . and he that is courageous 
among the mighty shall flee away naked in that day, saith 
Yahweh." 1 

"For, behold, Yahweh cometh forth out of his place, 
and will come down, and tread upon the high places of 
the earth. And the mountains shall be melted under 
him, and the valleys shall be cleft, as wax before the fire, 
as waters that are poured down a steep place." 2 

"And I will make justice the line, and righteousness 
the plummet; and the hail shall sweep away the refuge 
of lies, and the waters shall overflow the hiding-place. 
. . . When the overflowing scourge shall pass through, 
then ye shall be trodden down by it. As often as it 
passeth through, it shall take you ; for morning by morn- 
ing shall it pass through, by day and by night: and it 
shall be nought but terror to understand the mes- 
sage. . . . 

"There shall be a visitation from Yahweh of hosts with 
thunder, and with earthquake, and great noise, with 
whirlwind and tempest, and the flame of a devouring 
fire. . . . 

"Behold, the name of Yahweh cometh from far, burn- 
ing with his anger, and in thick rising smoke; his lips 
are full of indignation, and his tongue is as a devouring 
fire; and his breath is as an overflowing stream, that 

1 Am. 1:14; 2:14 ff. 
a Mic. 1:3 f. 



44 The Promise of His Coming 

reacheth even to the neck, to sift the nations with the 
sieve of destruction. . . . And Yahweh will cause 
his glorious voice to be heard, and will show the lighting 
down of his arm, with the indignation of his anger, and 
the flame of a devouring fire, with a blast, and tempest, 
and hailstones. . . . For a Topheth is prepared of 
old ; yea, for the king it is made ready ; he hath made it 
deep and large; the pile thereof is fire and much wood; 
the breath of Yahweh, like a stream of brimstone, doth 
kindle it." 1 

"Behold, he shall come up as clouds, and his chariots 
shall be as the whirlwind: his horses are swifter than 
eagles. Woe unto us ! for we are ruined. . . . Be- 
hold, the tempest of Yahweh, even his wrath, is gone 
forth, yea, a whirling tempest: it shall burst upon the 
head of the wicked." 2 

These passages, which may be paralleled in nearly every 
prophet from Amos to Ezekiel, from 750 to 550 B. 0., 
exhibit an astonishing unanimity in the use of the terrify- 
ing features of natural catastrophes. Fire, smoke, 
tempest, whirlwind, hail, thunder, lightning, volcanic 
outbursts, famine, drought, pestilence, desolation, dark- 
ness, the overthrow of man, bird, and beast, desolation 
upon land and sea, all these are to be manifestations of 
Yahweh in the great "day." 

Although we cannot be absolutely sure, it would seem 
that the day of Yahweh was thought of as a world catas- 
trophe already in the eighth century. Hosea is easily 
so interpreted. 

"Yahweh hath a controversy with the inhabitants of 
the land, because there is no truth, nor goodness, nor 
knowledge of God in the land. . . . Therefore shall 
the land mourn, and every one that dwelleth therein shall 
languish, with the beasts of the field and the birds of the 



'Is. 28:17 ff.; 29:6; 30:27, 30, 33. 
£ Jer. 4:13; 23:19. 



Popular Theology 45 

heaven; yea, the fishes of the sea also shall be taken 
away." 1 

The context would seem to indicate that the prophet 
is thinking only of his own land and some calamity that 
was at that moment upon it. 2 But the Hebrew word erec 
means either "earth," or "land," and when beasts, birds, 
and fishes are included in the catastrophe, it is but a short 
step to the universal. Certainly JSTahum, Zephaniah, and 
Ezekiel thus picture it. In Zephaniah we read, 

"I will utterly consume all things from off the face 
of the ground, saith Yahweh. I will consume man and 
beast; I will consume the birds of the heavens, and the 
fishes of the sea, and the stumbling blocks with the 
wicked; and I will cut off man from off the face of the 
ground, saith Yahweh." 3 

The Doom Song of Babylon, written by a younger con- 
temporary of Ezekiel, paints it most distinctly: 

"Behold, the day of Yahweh cometh, cruel, with wrath 
and fierce anger; to make the land a desolation, and to 
destroy the sinners thereof out of it. For the stars of 
heaven and the constellations thereof shall not give their 
light; the sun shall be darkened in its going forth, and 
the moon shall not cause its light to shine. And I will 
punish the world for their evil, and the wicked for their 
iniquity. «. . . Therefore I will make the heavens to 
tremble, and the earth shall be shaken out of its place, 
in the wrath of Yahweh of hosts, and in the day of his 
fierce anger." 4 

It is entirely possible, although it cannot be conclusively 
proved, that this world catastrophe was thought of as a 
sort of second flood 5 which should inaugurate a new 
world order; it was the concluding act in the drama of 

1 4:1-3. 

a So most commentators. The "shall" of verse 3 should be "doth v . 

•1:2 f. Cp. Am. 8:9; Is. 28:22; Ez. 38:19-23. 

4 Is. 13:9-11, 13. 

5 Cp. Is. 54:9; 28:17 If. 



46 The Promise of His Coming 

the old world cycle which, by destroying the old, made 
way for the new cycle which was to begin again with the 
age of gold. 1 Those pictures of the new age which rep- 
resent it as an idyllic time of universal peace and good 
will between man and beast, as in a restored Garden of 
Eden, bear out this supposition. 



III. Mythological Influences 

The national theology, then, accounts for the fact that 
the day of Yahweh included the idea of a great battle 
and the expectation of a terrible catastrophe. Certain 
other traits appear in the descriptions of the coming "day" 
that cannot thus be explained. How these were borrowed 
from current mythology we will now try to show. Since 
this side of the subject is newer and more open to de- 
bate, it will be necessary to give special space to its dis- 
cussion. 

Far more than any other ancient race, the Hebrews 
progressed beyond the primitive myths in which the be- 
ginnings of religion express themselves and eliminated 
them from their sacred writings. We cannot but believe 
that the Hebrews originally had such mythology and that 
it persisted among the people long after the leaders of 
the race, the men who gave us the literature which is 
preserved, had abandoned such naive views; for all other 
races which have left literatures and the primitive peoples 
who still exist in parts of the world bear witness to the 
universal tendency of mankind to put their first dawning 
consciousness of matters theological and religious into 
stories of gods and heroes and dragons. When now we 
come to compare the extant Hebrew literature with the 
mythologies of the neighboring races we find here and 
there traces of the same myths that made up the full con- 

1 Gressmann, Ursprung, pp. 159-168, preserves germs of truth amid 
some fanciful combinations. 



Mythological Influences 47 

tent of theology for these less moral and less thoughtful 
nations. 

For example, very close parallels to the Hebrew story 
of the Creation and the Flood are to be found among the 
Babylonians, and the idea of a primitive Paradise is 
known almost the world over. 1 That the biblical writers 
had cuneiform documents before them from which they 
took and transformed certain mythological materials as 
a modern writer uses illustrations and anecdotes is, of 
course, not to be supposed. But that such materials were 
to be found in the traditions of the race and, as a part 
of the intellectual and emotional background of the people, 
were used to point a moral, to illustrate a truth, is not 
to be denied. 2 We must even go a step farther. The 
biblical writers found truth revealed to them in these 
myths, truth nobler and purer than the common people 
could conceive; and they used and adapted these well 
known traditions to convey to their less thoughtful con- 
temporaries their new vision. The old stories, therefore, 
were partially recast, and repeatedly alluded to in the 
writings of the great teachers of Israel. They come down 
to us, not only in the traditions of Genesis, but also in 
poetical allusions in many parts of the Bible. It is this 
"floating myth material/' taken up into our Bible and 
used sometimes in quite a different sense from that which 
it had among the people, out of which our picture of the 
early Hebrew conceptions of the day of Yahweh and the 
Golden Age which should follow it must in part be con- 
structed. Fortunately the task has already been under- 

1 See Rogers, Cuneiform Parallels to the Old Testament, (Oxford 

University Press, 1912), pp. 1-186; ERE, arts. "Cosmogony 
and Cosmology," "Deluge," and "Blest, Abode of"; EDB, arts. 
"Cosmogony," etc. 

2 "Critics have not taken adequate account of possible foreign and 

traditional elements in the religious beliefs of pre-exilic Israel." 
Knudson, Religious Teachings of the OT } p. 33. 



48 The Promise of His Coming 

taken by various writers and some results have been 
achieved. 1 

Three myths in particular bear upon the problem of 
this book, (1) that of the primeval monster of darkness 
and disorder, (2) that of the divine hero who overthrows 
this monster, and (3) that of the resulting age of happi- 
ness and peace which this divine savior ushers in. In the 
Babylon myth Tiamat, the female dragon of the deep, 
conspires with her fellows to destroy the gods. As she 
advances with a terrifying brood of monsters to attack 
them, Anshar, commander of the gods, sends Ea and Anu 
to the defence, but they quail before the dreadful hosts 
of evil. Then Marduk comes to the rescue. He catches 
Tiamat in his net, drives the storm wind down her gaping 
throat, and pierces her heart with his spear. Having 
conducted her blood away to unknown regions, he makes 
one half of her body into the firmament, setting a guard 
to keep back the waters above, and builds a palace for 
the gods. He probably uses the second half of the body 
to make the earth, and then proceeds with the other 
steps of creation. 2 

That essentially the same myth was known among the 
Hebrews is evident, not merely from the creation story 
of Genesis, but from numerous references to the monster 
of the deep, called sometimes the Deep, sometimes the Sea, 
sometimes Leviathan, sometimes Behemoth, sometimes 
Rahab, sometimes the Serpent. 3 Tehom, the Hebrew 

1 The pioneer was Gunkel in his Schopfung und Chaos in TJrzeit und 

Endzeit (1895). The two works to which I owe most are Hugo 
Gressmann, Der Ursprung der israelitisch-jiidischen Eschatologie 
( "Forschungen zur Religion und Literature des Alten und Neuen 
Testaments," Gottingen, 1905), and W. 0. E. Oesterley, The 
Evolution of the Messianic Idea (New York, 1908). On the 
matter of method see the last, pp. 1-15, 39 f. 

2 See HBD I 505, and Oesterley, Messianic Idea, p. 61. 

8 Gen. 1:2; Am. 9:3; Is. 51:9 f.; 30:7; 27:1; Ps. 74:12-15; 89:9 ff.; 
Job 26:12 f.; 40:15-41; 34; cp. Oesterley, op cit., pp. 45-58. 
That some of these passages are late is to be noted, but Am. 
9:3 shows the myth to have been familiar to the early Hebrews, 
as, from their close connections with Babylonia, we should hare 
expected. 



Mythological Influences 49 

word for "deep" in Gen. 1 :2, is etymologically the same as 
Tiamat. In his account of creation the biblical writer 
has completely eliminated the mythology out of which 
he creates it. In other passages, such as Is. 51 :9 f. and 
Ps. 74:12-15, the mythological background is plainly in 
evidence, although in some instances the language may 
be regarded as figurative. For the great majority of He- 
brews this primeval monster of the abyss, rival of the 
gods in heathen mythology, of Yahweh in Hebrew thought, 
still existed as the embodiment of evil, first in the sense 
of physical or material harm, later as the source of moral 
evil. The serpent in the story of the Fall is the same 
hostile power, subtly making inroads into the kingdom 
of the good deity who had conquered him in fair fight. 
When one compares the Babylonian myth with Is. 
51 :9 f., it is quite evident that Yahweh has simply taken 
the place of Marduk. 

"Awake, awake, put on strength, arm of Yahweh; 
awake, as in the days of old, the generations of ancient 
times. Is it not thou that didst cut Rahab in pieces, that 
didst pierce the monster ? Is it not thou that driedst up 
the sea, the waters of the great deep; that madest the 
depths of the sea a way for the redeemed to pass over?" 

Psalm 104:5-9 has almost completely transformed the 
myth: 

He founded the earth upon its bases," 1 

That it should not be moved for ever. 

Thou coveredst it with the deep (Tehom) as with a 

vesture ; 
The waters stood above the mountains. 
At thy rebuke they fled; 
At the voice of thy thunder they hasted away 
(The mountains rose, the valleys sank down) 
Unto the place which thou hadst founded for them. 
Thou hast set a bound that they may not pass pver ; 
That they turn not again to cover the earth." 

1 Using the marginal reading of the ASV. 



50 The Promise of His Coming 

Other passages show still less distinct allusions. 1 In 
view of the process of editing and adapting through which 
the material has gone, as Oesterley says, 

"it is not to be expected that these passages should offei 
much more than echoes of the distant past. But those 
echoes seem, at any rate, to reveal the root-idea, viz., thai 
a 'Savior-Hero' subdued the primeval watery monster: 
he then formed men and became their Benefactor 01 
'Heilbringer* in that he gave them material blessings, 
This figure, at first probably only an indistinct Ancestor- 
Hero, gradually assumed a superhuman character, . . , 
finally the God of Israel, Yahweh, became identified with 
him. . . . The central root-idea is belief in the ex- 
istence of a great Divine-Human Helper, who, subduing 
the Dragon, prepared the way for the presence of men 
on earth; these men he made, and furnished them with 
material blessings." 2 

As we have seen above, the primeval monster, the 
source of evil, material and spiritual, was not destroyed, 
but merely conquered, according to Hebrew belief. Thus 
the presence of evil in the world which Yahweh had cre- 
ated was explained. 3 Following the idea of the myth i1 
was natural that the belief should arise that some daj 
Yahweh would return to complete the task and utterlj 
annihilate the old Dragon and all her brood. Since the 
Savior-Creator of the original myth had in popular thoughl 
traits of both the divine and the human, the poetic lan- 
guage describing his return to the earth exhibits, some- 
times the one, sometimes the other conception, or even both 
combined. This hope is crossed by another that arose 
quite naturally in the southern kingdom, the expectation 
of the restoration of the glories of the Davidic dynasty, 

1 Gen. 2:5-7; Ps. 65:6 ff. ; 89:6 fL; cp. Oesterley, Messianic Idea, pp, 

83-107. 
8 Op. cit., pp. 106 f. 
3 This was only one of several explanations of the origin of sin 

It is not implied that this cycle of myths was the only theologj 

of the Hebrews. 



Mythological Influences 51 

We may well suppose that Isaiah was not going far be- 
yond the hopes of the people when he painted his pic- 
ture of the child that should be born, whose name should 
be called "Wonderful Counsellor, Mighty God, Everlast- 
ing Father, and Prince of Peace." Such language can 
be accounted for as the exaggerated "court style" of 
ancient oriental lands, in which the king was frequently 
endowed with the attributes of divinity. 1 How much of 
this language was literally intended and how much fig- 
uratively it is difficult for us to say, for the distinctioij. 
is a modern and a western one. Here were the elements 
ready for the development of the messianic idea. 

In the transfer of the myth of the primeval conflict to 
the future and its confusion with the coming day of 
Yahweh we have the explanation of many phrases in 
the description of that day which are otherwise unin- 
telligible, and illumination of some that otherwise would 
not appear notable. Thus Yahweh's "strong hand" and 
"mighty arm" are renowned for their victory over Rahab. 2 
Yahweh's sword, taking the place of Marduk's spear, 
will punish Leviathan and slay the monster that is in 
the sea in that day? 

We understand why in Rev. 20:2 allusion is made to 
the "Devil and Satan" as "the dragon, the old serpent," 
and why in Rev. 21:1, when the new heaven and new 
earth appear, "the sea is no more." The sea stands as 
representative of the old dragon, which, indeed, according 
to the myth, it was. 

To sum up our conclusions thus far: The descriptions 
of natural convulsions were an indispensable part of the 
prophet's literary stock in trade; they had an essential 
place in his repertoire, like the Hungarian rhapsody for 
an orchestra. They are like the allusions to biblical nar- 
ratives, Greek mythology, fairy stories, and well known 

1 Gressmann, Ursprung, pp. 250-259. 

*Ps. 89:10, 13. 

•Is. 27:1; cp. Gressmann, Ursprung, pp. 76-81. ' , - . , 



52 The Promise of His Coming 

historical events which enliven and illustrate our litera- 
ture. This could hardly have been true unless they were 
also an accepted part of the popular conception of the 
day of Yahweh. 1 

It is probable that in Nahum, Zephaniah, and Ezekiel, 
earnest souls, but less gifted than others of the early 
prophets, we come nearest to the popular conception. 2 
For them, as for all Israel since their entrance into Ca- 
naan, Yahweh was a god of war as well as of nature. 
His weapons were the thunder, the lightning, the hail, 
the tornado, the earthquake, the volcano, the plague, the 
pestilence. His armies were the flames of great confla- 
grations, the swarms of locusts and palmerworms and 
flies, the beasts of the field, poisonous serpents, the satyrs 
and demons of the wilderness, the very stars of the 
heavens, the celestial powers, the demons of the abyss. 
Israel's God was "Yahweh of hosts," commander, not 
merely of the armies of Israel, nor even of the heavenly 
hosts alone, but of all the activities and energies of the 
universe, natural and supernatural, angelic and demonic. 3 
More than that, he was the benefactor-hero who at the 
beginning slew the dragon of the abyss, the great enemy 
of good, and who eventually would reappear to complete 
his victory over all the hosts of evil, human and demonic. 
On the basis of such a conception of Yahweh, Nahum 
could say, 

"Yahweh taketh vengeance on his adversaries, and he 
reserveth wrath for his enemies. . . . Yahweh hath 
his way in the whirlwind and in the storm, and the 

1 See Oesterley, Messianic Idea, pp. 241-248. 

2 See Buttenwieser, Prophets of Israel, p. xxi. 

'Marti, Dodekapropheton, p. 190, on Am. 5:15, says that the term 
Yahweh of hosts means "God of all forces, also, e.g., of the As- 
syrian armies." He refers to his Geschichte der israelitischen 
Religion, ed. 4, p. 139 f., ed. 5, 1907, pp. 157 ff., and to Schwally, 
Semit. Kriegsaltertumer, p. 5, who thinks that it originally 
meant "Lord of the war demons." Gressmann thinks the title 
borrowed from another god and its original meaning forgotten, 
Ursprung, p. 76. 



The Expected Golden Age 53 

clouds are the dust of his feet. He rebuketh the sea, 
and maketh it dry, and drieth up all the rivers. . . . 
The mountains quake at him, and the hills melt; and 
the earth is upheaved at his presence, yea, the world, and 
all that dwell therein. Who can stand before his indig- 
nation? and who can abide in the fierceness of his anger? 
his wrath is poured out like fire, and the rocks are broken 
asunder by him. Yahweh is good, a stronghold in the 
day of trouble; and he knoweth them that take refuge 
in him. But with an over-running flood he will make 
a full end of her place, and will pursue his enemies into 
darkness." 1 



IV. The Expected Golden Age 

The result of such a coming of Yahweh as was ex- 
pected could only be the highest happiness and prosperity 
of Israel. Am. 5 : 18-20 is decisive as to the content of the 
prevailing view. No one would "desire the day of Yah- 
weh" if it were not to be a day of joy and triumph. It 
is quite evident that the prophet is combatting this pop- 
ular optimism when he insists that that day is to be 
darkness and not light. 2 Just how it was expected that 
the Hebrew nation would escape the anticipated world- 
wide catastrophe, we need not inquire. Popular theology 
is never worked out consistently in all its details. More- 
over, the much more thoughtful prophets do not explain 
just how the remnant they expected to survive that day 
would be saved. Yahweh would take care of his people, 
of that the multitude was sure. 

We can only guess at the conditions they expected to 

1 1:2-8. 

2 Professor Knudsorrs arguments for identifying the popular and pro- 
phetic point of view (Relig. Teachings of the OT, pp. 358 ff.) 
do not appear to me conclusive. The one expression which sus- 
tains his contention that the people expected judgment to be 
visited upon Israel, "ye that put far away the evil day" (Am. 
6:3), may easily be explained as expressing the attitude of in- 
difference taken by many toward the prophet's message. 



54 The Promise of His Coming 

prevail after the wrath was overpassed. Yet in all prob- 
ability the prophets borrowed the language of popular 
faith to describe the future Golden Age, as they did to 
portray the intervening destruction. Many critics have 
supposed the passage found in Mic. 4 :l-3 and Is. 2 :2-4 to 
have been quoted by these two contemporaries from an 
earlier prophet, as presenting "a 'classic' description of the 
ideal Kingdom of God. m Furthermore, it may be thought 
that the passage states the conception which was popularly 
accepted as to the character of the Golden Age that would 
dawn when Yahweh had overthrown his enemies and 
ruled the world. As we shall see later, the prophets took 
long steps in advance of the popular view. They intro- 
duced moral elements which were entirely lacking in the 
faith of the masses. We cannot, therefore, take any pas- 
sage that has come down in our Old Testament books as 
depicting the expectations of the "man in the street." 

It is entirely consistent, however, with our previous 
picture of the popular faith 2 to take as substantially de- 
scriptive of it those passages which portray an ideal, happy, 
prosperous future, in which no Israelite should want and 
in which the nation should be supreme in all the earth. 
!N~o Hebrew could refuse to believe that 

"in the latter days it $hall come to pass, that the moun- 
tain of Yahweh's house shall be established on the top 
of the mountains, and it shall be exalted above the hills; 
and peoples shall flow unto it. And many nations shall 
go and say, Come ye, and let us go up to the mountain 
of Yahweh, and to the house of the God of Jacob; and 
he will teach us of his ways, and we will walk in his 
paths. For out of Zion shall go forth the law, and the 
word of Yahweh from Jerusalem ; and he will judge be- 
tween many peoples, and will decide concerning strong 



1 Eiselen, The Minor Prophets (New York, 1907), p. 399. For the 
contrary view see J. M. P. Smith, "Int. Crit. Com.," Micah, etc., 
p. 84. 

2 See above, pp. 31-39. 



The Expected Golden Age 55 

nations afar off: and they shall beat their swords into 
plowshares, and their spears into pruning-hooks ; nation 
shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they 
learn war any more. But they shall sit every man under 
his vine and under his fig-tree ; and none shall make them 
afraid: for the mouth of Yahweh of hosts hath spoken 
it." 1 

Micah gives an interesting verse which Isaiah has 
omitted. Whether the description of the "peaceful Pal- 
estinian countryside with the rural inhabitants in the 
enjoyment of peace and plenty" 2 in verse 4 is quoted by 
Micah from a predecessor, or was added by a later hand, 
it contributes an important trait to the portrayal of the 
popular hope. 

The "universalism" of the passage may well have been 
beyond the purview of the religion of the average man. 
His horizon was a narrow one. He might not even go 
so far as to care for the service which other nations 
could render him. He would wish to be let alone. "The 
chosen land for the chosen people" would satisfy all his 
desires. The latter days would be a time of idyllic peace 
and plenty : he cared for nothing more. 

In the popular conception of the new era to follow the 
day of Yahweh many mythological traits are to be noted. 
Since after the primeval conflict the Savior-Hero created 
man and gave him material blessings, it was but natural 
that the same result should be expected to follow his final 
victory. The Golden Age at the beginning of the world 
would return again when Yahweh appeared in his might. 
That the myth of the Garden of Eden was well known 
among the Hebrews is proved, not only by its presence in 
Genesis, but also by occasional allusions in other parts of 

'Mic. 4:1-4. 

2 J. M. P. Smith, op. cit., p. 87 f«; it seems to me an argument for 
the antiquity of the whole passage that the "peasant prophet" 
retains this touch, while the city-bred Isaiah drops it. Se« 
below, p. 81 f., for a discussion of the date of these "hopeful" 
passages. 



56 The Promise of His Coming 

the Bible. 1 The most striking characteristic of exist- 
ence in this primitive paradise was its Arcadian peace 
and material comfort, just that which any Israelite, in the 
days when invasion and want threatened on every side, 
would most desire. We can well understand, then, how 
the prophets borrowed traits from the popular notion to 
paint the new era when Yahweh really came to reign as a 
time when there should be no more war and the people 
should live in joy and plenty. One might not suspect 
any mythological coloring were it not for the fact that all 
nature is to be transformed. "The wolf shall dwell with 
the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; 
and the calf and the young lion and the fatling together; 
and a little child shall lead them." 2 

Along with the change of animal nature goes the trans- 
formation of the desert. Yahweh says, according to the 
great prophet of the Exile, 

"I will open rivers on the bare heights, and fountains 
in the midst of the valleys; I will make the wilderness a 
pool of water, and the dry land springs of water/' 3 

The hills are to be razed and the valleys filled, 4 Jeru- 
salem is to be set upon the tops of the mountains, 5 and 
from the temple will flow a river of living water. 6 Such 
language shows the myth-making fancy rather than the 
poetical imagination at work. 

Had the idea of the Messiah already been introduced, 
or was it the popular expectation that Yahweh would act 
directly and in his own person? In view of the lack of 
literary remains of the popular religion, we cannot decide 
how far the prophets are responsible for the conception of 

*Ez. 28:13; Is. 51:3; cp. Oesterley, Messianic Idea, pp. 123-129. 
2 Is. 11:6; cp. Hos. 2:18, "a covenant with the beasts of the field." 
*Is. 41:18; cp. 30:25; 43:19 f. 
*Is. 40:4; 42:16; 49:11. 

5 Is. 2:2=Mic. 4:1. 

6 Ez. 47:1-12; Zech. 14:8; see Gressmann, Ursprung, pp. 112, 224- 

227. 



The Expected Golden Age 57 

the ideal ruler. The problem is further complicated by 
the fact that a majority of critical scholars formerly re- 
garded those passages in the earlier prophets which por- 
tray the coming king as interpolations from a later hand. 1 
The study, however, of Hebrew eschatology in the light 
of conceptions current in other nations and a more care- 
ful investigation of remnants of popular belief imbedded 
in Hebrew literature have caused a decided reaction 
against this scepticism, as it has in the matter of all the 
passages describing a glorious future after the day of 
wrath. 2 We certainly are justified in supposing that the 
theory was current that the Davidic line would recover 
its ancient power and glory after that "great and terrible 
day/' and would rule as direct representative of Yahweh 
in a powerful and prosperous kingdom. If we do not 
read too much into the "court language" of the prophets, 
their picture of the ideal ruler is not anachronistic. 

It is perfectly clear that both Assyrians and Egyptians 
expected a king to arise who would put an end to injustice 
and suffering and usher in a "Golden Age," a "millen- 
nium," although these terms are, to be sure, not used. 
Various monarchs even claim to realize this expectation. 3 
The language used is, to us, highly hyperbolical, implying 
supernatural attainments. The Hebrews were, of course, 
aware of this expectation and the claims to have fulfilled 
it. They naturally believed with complete conviction that 
it was their royal line which would eventually realize the 
hope of the nations. Therefore there is no difficulty in 
ascribing to the earliest writing prophets very lofty claims 
for the future perfect king of the Davidic line. 

May we add to this king the supernatural characteristics 
which belong to the Savior-Hero of mythology ? The prob- 
abilities seem against this. We have as yet no direct 
evidence on the point. So long as the people could think 

x For example, Is. 9:1-7; 11:1-10. 

2 See Knudson, Relig. Teachings of the OT, p. 33. 

* See above, p. 9. 



58 The Promise of His Coming 

anthropomorphically of Yahweh, a divine-human king was 
unnecessary in the great drama of the day of Yahweh and 
likewise in the new era that should follow. Yahweh him- 
self would appear to overthrow their enemies and to inau- 
gurate the new kingdom, which would be ruled by a 
Davidic monarch as his viceroy. The materials for the 
development of the conception of the messiah were already 
present, however, in the thought of the nation in pre-Isaian 
times, and only waited the touch of the hand of the master 
to begin to reveal their inherent truth. 1 

The account which we have given of popular religion in 
the days of the first writing prophets implies a recon- 
struction of accepted views on the history of Israel's re- 
ligious development. It has been customary for critical 
scholars to agree that Hebrew eschatology and apocalypti- 
cism were the product of exilic and postexilic times. 2 We 
have adopted a view which is described as "a complete re- 
versal of current views concerning Hebrew eschatology." 3 
It does not necessarily involve an earlier date for the 
hopeful prophecies, but it does make such a dating much 
easier to accept. It adopts a view which makes the devel- 
opment of Hebrew prophecy more natural and easily 
understood. 

Briefly summarized this theory is as follows: Out of 
primitive superstitious fear, the sense of dependence upon 
higher powers, the desire for happiness, there grew up 
among the Hebrews, as among other nations, certain 
myths explaining the origin of the world and the course 
of its future history. 4 With these were combined the 

1 See above, p. 51. 

2 H. P. Smith, The Religion of Israel, PP- 161, 241 ff.; Charles, 
Eschatology, p. 83 f. 

3 J. M. P. Smith, "Int. Crit. Com.", Micah, etc., p. 12. Professor 
Smith in his review of Gressmann (Am. Journal of Theol., XI 
[1907], 320-322), admits some of his contentions, and, as it 
appears to me, does not undermine his fundamental proposi- 
tions. 

* See Oesterley, Messianic Idea, pp. 19-28. 



The Expected Golden Age 59 

Hebrew national theology, resulting, in the time of the 
monarchy, in a firm hope that eventually Israel would 
triumph over all her foes through the mighty intervention 
of her God. This hope was already clad in language which 
may be designated as apocalyptic, representing the the- 
ophany which was to usher in the new day as a natural 
catastrophe, or series of catastrophes, in which the ele- 
ments should fight for Israel. It was thoroughly "super- 
natural," to use a modern category, in that it represented 
Yahweh as working contrary to the ordinary course of 
nature and outside the course of historical causation. It 
was eschatological, not merely in that it dealt with the 
future, but also that it described the blissful era of peace 
and prosperity which Israel should enjoy under the pro- 
tection of Tahweh. This, then, was the national hope 
with which the earliest writing prophets had to reckon 
and which they used in conveying to their fellow coun- 
trymen the messages Tahweh had spoken to their souls. 



CHAPTER III 

PROPHETIC REINTERPRETATION 

I. The Day of Wrath 

THE prophets fully adopt the language of mythological 
catastrophe in describing the visitation of Yahweh's 
wrath. They use it differently according to their individ- 
ual literary taste, originality, and spiritual outlook. As 
one reads Amos, Hosea, and Isaiah, he cannot help no- 
ticing that, while they have not a little of such material, 
what they use is powerfully, rather than grotesquely ex- 
pressed, and it seems to bear a figurative rather than a 
literal meaning. Micah has almost none of it. Zephaniah, 
Habukkuk, and Galium make constant use of the lan- 
guage of cataclysmic overthrow. Jeremiah, partly per- 
haps because he is less imaginative, deals mainly with 
conditions that are immediately before his eyes and wan- 
ders very rarely into the cloudland of these catastrophic 
rhapsodies. Ezekiel makes more constant use of such 
language than any other prophet in the Bible. 1 

It cannot be maintained that any of these mouthpieces 
of Yahweh believed that what they foretold would actually 
take place. Paul's use of the Stoic idea of a final world 
conflagration in I Co. 3 :12-15 is parallel to what I under- 
stand to have been the prophet's use of current eschatol- 
ogy. He is speaking of a spiritual entity, the church, 
which is to be tested in "that day" by the "fire" of judg- 

a See the excellent article by R. H. Kennett, "The Development of 
the Apocalyptic Style," Interpreter VTII 4 (London, July, 1912), 
386-401 ; more emphasis should be laid on mythological allusions 
(cp. p. 401), following the lines of Gressmann and Oesterley. 

60 



The Day of Wrath 61 

ment. Such language is intelligible only on the basis 
of such a view as the writer of II Pt. 3 : 5-12 took literally 
That Paul understood it so, we cannot say. Just so the 
prophetic language rests upon and utilizes the popular 
eschatology, but fundamentally alters its application. 

One chief difference between the popular and the proph- 
etic conception of the day of Yahweh was in the historical 
application of the idea. To the prophets it was a catas- 
trophe, not in nature, but in society. In the minds of the 
people there was already much of that quietism later seen 
in Pharisaic circles, which dreamed that in Yahweh' s own 
good time he would break into the course of nature with 
a mighty catastrophe. Between history and that "far-off 
divine event" they saw no connection. It was, and is, the 
supreme task of the prophet to interpret present events 
in the light of eternal truth. And, therefore, the great 
prophets of Israel strove mightily to bring the people to 
see the dreadful day of Yahweh impending in the tre- 
mendous historical drama that was being played before 
their eyes, and in which they were compelled — all un- 
willingly — to be the chief actors. Without abandoning 
the mythological scenery familiar to the popular mind, 
they attempted to display it in such a fashion as to make 
the living actors more important than the stage setting. 
For the prophets the "hosts of Yahweh" are not chiefly 
the hosts of heaven and the destructive powers of nature, 
but the mighty armies of the Assyrians, the Scythians, 
the Babylonians, and the Persians, whose tread shakes 
the lands like an earthquake; who sweep over the world 
like a destroying flood ; in whose wake rises the smoke of 
burning cities and villages, as when Yahweh rained fire 
on the cities of the plain. At Yahweh's command the 
sword and famine and pestilence stalk together over the 
land. Nebuchadnezzar and Cyrus are his servants. 

"He will lift up an ensign to the nations from far, 
and will hiss for them from the end of the earth; and, 
behold, they shall come with speed swiftly. None shall 



62 The Promise of His Coming 

be weary or stumble among them; none shall slumber 
nor sleep ; neither shall the girdle of their loins be loosed, 
nor the latchet of their shoes broken: whose arrows are 
sharp, and all their bows bent; their horses' hoofs shall 
be accounted as flint, and their wheels as a whirlwind: 
their roaring shall be like a lioness, they shall roar like 
young lions; yea, they shall roar, and lay hold of the 
prey, and carry it away, and there shall be none to deliver. 
And they shall roar against them in that day like the 
roaring of the sea : and if one look unto the land, behold, 
darkness and distress; and the light is darkened in the 
clouds thereof." 1 

"Forasmuch as this people have refused the waters of 
Shiloah that go softly, and rejoice in Eezin and Eeme- 
liah's son; now therefore, behold, the Lord bringeth up 
upon them the waters of the Eiver, strong and many, 
even the king of Assyria and all his glory: and it shall 
come up over all its channels, and go over all its banks; 
and it shall sweep onward into Judah; it shall overflow 
and pass through; it shall reach even to the neck; and 
the stretching out of its wings shall fill the breadth of 
thy land, Immanuel." 2 

Thus Isaiah gives a marvellously powerful and imagina- 
tive interpretation of the mythological conception of the 
day of Tahweh in terms of contemporary history. Jere- 
miah almost sloughs off the supernatural coloring. He 
threatens the people continually (eighteen times all told) 
with famine, pestilence, and the sword, that trinity of 
terrors that perched upon the banners of Nebuchadnezzar. 
His manner of thinking is represented in the following: 

"Wherefore thus saith Yahweh, the God of hosts, Be- 
cause ye speak this word, behold, I will make my words 
in thy mouth fire, and this people wood, and it shall de- 
vour them. Lo, I will bring a nation upon you from 
far, house of Israel, saith Yahweh : it is a mighty na- 
tion, it is an ancient nation, a nation whose language 



1 Is. 5:26-30. 

2 Is. 8:6 ff,; cp. 10:5 ff., 28-32. 



The Day of Wrath 63 

thous knowest not, neither understandest what they say. 
Their quiver is an open sepulchre, they are all mighty 
men. And they shall eat up thy harvest, and thy bread, 
which thy sons and thy daughters should eat; they shall 
eat up thy flocks and thy herds; they shall eat up thy 
vines and thy fig-trees ; they shall beat down thy fortified 
cities, wherein thou trustest, with the sword." 1 

When finally captivity has come upon Judah, as for- 
merly upon the northern kingdom, Jeremiah and Ezekiel 
feel themselves to be in the very midst of the great his- 
torical catastrophe which, for them, is the day of Yahweh. 

"Behold, the tempest of Yahweh, even his wrath, is 
gone forth, yea, a whirling tempest: it shall burst upon 
the head of the wicked. The anger of Yahweh shall not 
return, until he have executed, and till he have performed 
the intents of his heart : in the latter days ye shall under- 
stand it perfectly." 2 

"Thus saith the Lord Yahweh: An evil, an only evil; 
behold, it cometh. An end is come, the end is come; it 
awaketh against thee; behold, it cometh. Thy doom 
(margin: The turn, or The crowning time) is come unto 
thee, inhabitant of the land : the time is come, the day 
is near, a day of tumult, and not of joyful shouting, upon 
the mountains. Now will I shortly pour out my wrath 
upon thee, and accomplish mine anger against thee, and 
will judge thee according to thy ways. . . . Behold, 
the day, behold, it cometh: thy doom is gone forth; the 
rod hath blossomed, pride hath budded. . . . The 
time is come, the day draw^eth near." 3 

The mythological sword of Yahweh becomes the sword 
of Nebuchadnezzar : 

"Thus saith Yahweh: Say, A sword, a sword, it is 
sharpened, it is also furbished; it is sharpened that it may 
make a slaughter; it is furbished that it may be as 
lightning. . . . Also, thou son of man, appoint thee 



iJer. 5:14-17; cp. Hab. 1:5-11. 
2 Jer. 23:19 f. 
3 Ez. 7:5 ff., 10, 12. 



64 The Promise of His Coming 

two ways, that the sword of the king of Babylon may 
come." 1 

"I sought for a man among them, that should build 
up the wall, and stand in the gap before me for the land, 
that I should not destroy it; but I found none. There- 
fore have I poured out mine indignation upon them; I 
have consumed them with the fire of my wrath: their 
own way have I brought upon their heads, saith the Lord 
Yahweh." 2 

Such language clearly represents the day of Yahweh as 
a historical event, divine and providential in its purposes, 
but not supernatural or miraculous in its methods. It is 
the punishment of Israel in the Babylonian captivity. 

When, at length, the blow has fully fallen, the later 
prophets come to view the matter in a new light. Israel 
had her day of Yahweh in the Exile. Israel's little neigh- 
bors received their due at the hand of Assyria or Baby- 
lonia. Jeremiah 51:7 says, 

"Babylon hath been a golden cup in Yahweh's hand, 
that made all the earth drunken : the nations have drunk 
of her wine ; therefore the nations are mad." 

So Assyria shall, in turn, fall before the Medes, 3 Egypt 
shall meet her day of Yahweh at the hand of the Baby- 
lonians, 4 and Babylon hers again at the end of the 
Medes. 5 All the prophets give these "days" more or less 
of eschatological coloring, but they plainly refer to his- 
torical events. 

These historical occurrences, however, could not be re- 
garded as fulfilling the old Hebrew idea of the day of 
Yahweh as a cosmic catastrophe. Moreover, the terrible 
invasion from the north, long an element of popular ex- 



x Ez. 


21:9 f., 


19. 


2 Ez. 


22:30 f. 




3 Nahum. 




*Ez. 


29-32. 




6 Is. 


13. 





The Day of Wrath 65 

pectation 1 and explicitly prophesied by Jeremiah 2 had 
never taken place. The nations had not been sufficiently 
punished and, most important of all, Yahweh's might had 
not been convincingly displayed. Therefore Ezekiel puts 
the day of Yahweh, the final all-embracing day, off into 
the distant future. 

Israel will for long years enjoy her new age of unex- 
ampled prosperity, which will ensue upon the sufferings of 
the Captivity. Then all the distant nations, which, up 
to that time, had not known Yahweh's power, will as- 
semble to attack her under the leadership of a mythical 
Gog, of the land of Magog. Yahweh will meet them 
with an overwhelming destruction. 

"For in my jealousy and in the fire of my wrath have 
I spoken, Surely in that day there shall be a great shak- 
ing in the land of Israel; so that the fishes of the sea, 
and the birds of the heavens, and the beasts of the field, 
and all creeping things that creep upon the earth, and 
all the men that are upon the face of the earth, shall 
shake at my presence, and the mountains shall be thrown 
down, and the steep places shall fall, and every wall shall 
fall to the ground. And I will call for a sword against 
him unto all my mountains, saith the Lord Yahweh: 
every man's sword shall be against his brother. And 
with pestilence and with blood will I enter into judgment 
with him ; and I will rain upon him, and upon his hordes, 
and upon the many peoples that are with him, an over- 
flowing shower, and great hailstones, fire, and brim- 
stone/' 3 

In this account, for the first time, we have an explicit 
interpretation and application of an older prophecy. Other 
prophets had taken over and used well known predictions, 
but without noting the fact. Ezekiel makes Yahweh speak 
thus to Gog: 



1 Gressmann, Ursprung, pp. 174-192. 

2 Chap. 4-6. 
3 Ez. 38:19-22. 



66 The Promise of His Coming 

"Thou art he of whom I spake in old time by my 
servants the prophets of Israel, that prophesied in those 
days for many years that I would bring thee against 
them." 1 

Ezekiel may have been meeting objections to his faith that 
a long period of prosperity lay before his people, objections 
based on earlier prophecies of evil that had not been ful- 
filled. In any case he distinctly puts Yahweh' s revela- 
tion of himself away, out of the living present into the 
dreamy future. He removes it from the realm of history 
into that of mythology, from the tangible real into the 
mystical unreal. He marks a sorry retrogression to the 
unsocial conceptions of Amos' contemporaries. 

This defection only serves to throw into stronger light 
the true prophetic reinterpretation of the day of Yahweh. 
Instead of a supernatural, mythologically conceived catas- 
trophe in nature, having no connection with historical 
events and expected in the far distant future, the proph- 
ets thought of it as an economic, political, and social ca- 
tastrophe, growing out of historical circumstances, due, in 
fact, to Israel's manner of living, to her moral and re- 
ligious attitude, and taking place as a historical event in 
the near future. To be sure they use, more or less figura- 
tively, the old language of cosmic catastrophe; perhaps 
they have not entirely escaped the old ideas. But they 
are heralds of a new day, groping toward the dawn, try- 
ing, though uncertainly, to read Yahweh's relation to 
human life and society. 

Ezekiel, on the other hand, marks the re-emergence of 
the old popular conception of the day of Yahweh with the 
distinct and conscious reinterpretation of old prophecies 
to fit new or anticipated situations. In these two pointc, 
as in others, which we shall note later, he also marks the 

x Ez. 38:17. The sentence is to be read affirmatively rather than 
as an interrogation; Bertholet, Das Buck Hesekiel, "Kurzer 
Hand-commentar" (Freiburg i. B., 1897), p. 190; Charles 
Eschatology, p. 106. Reading it as a question does not affect the 
above argument, for an affirmative answer is implied. 



The Day of Wrath 67 

beginning of the age of apocalypses, to which we shall 
turn in the next chapter. 

Out of the attempt to use the old language of cosmic 
catastrophe and reinterpret it in terms of historical events 
grows one of the most common ideas of later Jewish and 
even modern Christian times — the belief that wars and 
rumors of wars or signal disasters of any kind are heralds 
of the end of the world. The interest aroused by the 
recent world w r ar is a case in point. I have been told 
that immediately following the great San Francisco earth- 
quake and fire, before the embers were cold, a vigorous 
Adventist propaganda was begun. Our earliest materials 
indicate the prevalence of the idea among the Hebrews 
that any disaster or loss was a warning that Tahweh was 
rising in his wrath. Amos says in Yahweh's name, 

"And I also have given you cleanness of teeth in all 
your cities, and want of bread in all your places; yet 
have ye not returned unto me, saith Yahweh. And I 
also have withholden the rain from you. ... I have 
smitten you with blasting and with mildew: the multi- 
tude of your gardens and your vineyards and your fig- 
trees and your olive-trees hath the palmer-worm de- 
voured ; yet have ye not returned unto me, saith Yahweh. 
I have sent among you the pestilence after the manner 
of Egypt. . . . Yet have ye not returned unto me, 
saith Yahweh. . . . Therefore, thus will I do unto 
thee, Israel, and because I will do this unto thee, pre- 
pare to meet thy God, Israel/' 1 

So any calamity was a warning to be prepared for the 
great day when Yahweh could appear to vindicate him- 
self by judging and punishing all unrighteousness. 

Now the prophets saw in the hostile armies that op- 
pressed Israel Yahweh's ministers of wrath. When, there- 
fore, the Assyrians began to sweep westward, or the 
Scythians to pour over the Caucasus and devastate Meso- 
potamia and Syria, they anticipated the speedy ravaging 

1 Am. 4:6-12. 



68 The Promise of His Coming 

of Palestine and began to proclaim the approach of the 
day of Yahweh. But they did not mean the end of the 
world in the modern conception of the term. It is only by 
combining the language of the world catastrophe which the 
prophets borrowed from the popular faith with the ac- 
cepted idea of divine warnings of impending punishment, 
as the prophets used it, that we come to the notion that 
wars, or any calamities, are divine warnings of the end 
of the world. In later literature we see how tremendously 
this idea took hold upon the Jewish and Christian mind 
and was developed and embellished. 1 



II. The Cause and Puepose of Yahweh's Self- 
Manifestation 

Having described the manner of Yahweh's self-mani- 
festation, we now turn to its cause and purpose. As we 
have already seen, everything in Israel's history and in 
her conception of Deity conduced to an unhesitating con- 
fidence in Yahweh's favor and the glorious future of the 
nation. Though present prospects seemed gloomy, Yah- 
weh was bound by his covenant, as well as by his self- 
interest, to interpose in their behalf. The popular hope, 
held by many, if not all, of the nation, was very simple: 
when Yahweh felt the time ripe, he would bring a great 
catastrophe upon the world which would destroy all his 
people's enemies, but, in the midst of this cataclysm, 
Israel would be saved, even as of old Noah had been. 
We have seen how the prophets tried to bring this con- 
ception of world catastrophe down out of the clouds into 
everyday life. Their greatest problem, however, was 

1 Clemen, Primitive Christianity and its ~N on- Jewish Sources ( Edin- 
burgh, 1912), pp. 117-142, discusses the signs of the end in 
detail and concludes that the particular expectations found 
among the Jews and Christians were not of foreign origin, but 
says, "That belief, however, in premonitory signs in general 
t , , is, I admit, of Babylonian origin." (p. 139.) 



Yahw eh's Self-Manifestation 69 

that of bringing out the moral elements already implicit 
in Israel's religion, and so interpreting the day of Yah- 
weh as to give it ethical content. 

The ancient conception of religion, in Israel and out of 
it, was completely materialistic. If the people brought 
the prescribed sacrifices and offerings, if the round of 
feasts was properly observed, Yahweh must favor his peo- 
ple. Had Israel become the Assyria of antiquity, had 
prosperity instead of reverses continued to be her lot, she 
probably would never have given the world her unique 
and supreme religious message. But disaster came, and 
Yahweh appeared completely to have disregarded his cov- 
enant, as the popular mind in the time of the monarchy 
understood it. Thus a new problem was forced upon 
the nation when she was permanently reduced to vassalage 
under Assyria, then Babylonia, then Persia. The com- 
plaint of Habakkuk, "O Yahweh, how long shall I cry, 
and thou wilt not hear? I cry out unto thee of violence, 
and thou wilt not save/' 1 came from her lips with ever 
greater vehemence. A psalm writer, probably of the Ex- 
ile, expresses well the thoughts that must have troubled 
many of his countrymen: 

"We have heard with our ears, God, 

Our fathers have told us, 

What work thou didst in their days, 

In the days of old. 

Thou didst drive out the nations with thy hand; 

But them thou didst plant: 

Thou didst afflict the peoples ; 

But them thou didst spread abroad. 



Thou art my King, God : 
Command deliverance for Jacob. 



In God have we made our boast all the day long, 
And we will give thanks unto thy name forever. 

1:2. 



70 The Promise of His Coming 

But thou hast cast us off, and brought us tc dis- 
honor, 
And goest not forth with our hosts. 



Thou hast made us like sheep appointed for food, 
And hast scattered us among the nations. 



Wherefore hidest thou thy face, 

And f orgettest our affliction and our oppression ? 

For our soul is bowed down to the dust : 

Our body cleaveth unto the earth. 

Eise up for our help, 

And redeem us for thy loving-kindness' sake." 1 

Was Yahweh unable to save his people? Believing, as 
all their neighbors did, that prosperity was the prime 
evidence of a god's power and favor, and disaster a proof 
either of his weakness or his anger, the Hebrew nation 
could not but face the most serious doubt during the long 
centuries when it suffered under the yoke of foreign op- 
pression. They could not believe that he would be angry 
forever. Was Yahweh as weak as the nation which wor- 
shipped him? Such was the belief of the time. When 
the Eabshakeh came to Jerusalem and tried, as modern 
foes have, to arouse a popular insurrection within the 
enemy nation, he warned the people, 

"Let not Hezekiah deceive you ; for he will not be able 
to deliver you: neither let Hezekiah make you trust in 
Yahweh, saying, Yahweh will surely deliver us ; this city 
shall not be given into the hand of the king of Assyria. 
. . . Beware lest Hezekiah persuade you, saying, 
Yahweh will deliver us. Hath any of the gods of the 
nations delivered his land out of the hands of the king 
of Assyria? Where are the gods of Hamath and Arpad? 
where are the gods of Sepharvaim? and have they de- 
livered Samaria out of my hand? Who are they among 
all the gods of these countries, that have delivered their 

^s. 44:1, 2, 4, 8, 9, 11, 24-26. 



Yaliwclis Self -Manifestation 71 

country out of my hand, that Yahweh should deliver 
Jerusalem out of my hand?" 1 

In the inscribed records of their conquests, the As- 
syrian monarchs usually give credit to Ashur for their 
victories. The god of the strong battalions was the strong 
god, and Yahweh must soon take his place alongside the 
gods of Samaria, and the other conquered nations, as a 
lesser deity in the Assyrian pantheon. Ahaz had appar- 
ently already adopted this view. 2 When Jerusalem was 
taken and laid waste by Nebuchadnezzar, no doubt very 
many Jews, like those who carried Jeremiah down into 
Egypt with them, believed that they had paid dearly for 
their faithfulness to Yahweh, and that it was only when 
they burned incense to the queen of heaven that they "had 
plenty of victuals, and were well, and saw no evil." 3 They 
would not listen to any word spoken in the name of Yah- 
weh, for he was unable to save them. 

The only alternative was to believe that Israel had 
so grievously sinned against Yahweh that she deserved 
exceptionally severe punishment at his hands. That is 
the view which all the prophets take. Not only did Yah- 
weh's covenant not bind him to favor Israel under all 
circumstances, but rather it gave him all the better reason 
for punishing their sins. a You only have I known of all 
the families of the earth : therefore I will visit upon you 
all your iniquities," Yahweh tells Amos. 4 Isaiah's won- 
derful little vineyard parable has the same moral. Yah- 
weh had lavished special care on his vineyard, yet it 
brought forth wild grapes. Therefore it should be tram- 
pled down and laid waste. 5 Micah says, "Then shall they 
cry unto Yahweh, but he will not answer them; yea, he 
will hide his face from them at that time, according as 

*Is. 36:14, 15, 18-20. 
2 II Kg. 16:10-18. 
s Jer. 44:16-18. 
4 Am. 3:2. 
8 Is. 5:1-7. 



72 The Promise of His Coming 

they have wrought evil in their doings. 1 It is for moral, 
not ritual delinquencies that they are to suffer. Through 
Amos Yahweh says, 

"1 hate, I despise your feasts, and I will take no de- 
light in your solemn assemblies. . . . Take thou 
away from me the noise of thy songs ; for I will not hear 
the melody of thy viols. But let justice roll down as 
waters, and righteousness as a mighty stream." 2 

"Cease to do evil; learn to do well; seek justice, relieve 
the oppressed, judge the fatherless, plead for the widow," 
says Isaiah. 5 The four great prophets of the latter part 
of the eighth century all agree that it is because of Israel's 
failure to live up to Yahweh' s standards of social moral- 
ity that he is sending terrible punishments upon them. 

In two most important particulars, then, these early 
prophets make an advance beyond their contemporaries: 

First, the purpose of Yahweh's self-manifestation was 
not to vindicate his people or his power, but his righteous- 
ness. 

Second, as a necessary corollary, the day of Yahweh 
would fall upon Israel as much as upon other nations. 
Amos very adroitly begins by showing how the day of 
Yahweh will affect the hated enemy nations surrounding 
Israel, but only to give himself the firmer ground for 
his message that, when Yahweh bares his mighty arm, 
it will fall heaviest upon his own people. 

Of all the pre-exilic prophets Nahum alone stands with 
those whom Israel's great religious leaders called false 
prophets. He has no word concerning heart religion or 
social righteousness. 

"Behold, upon the mountains the feet of him that 
brmgeth good tidings, that publisheth peace! Keep 
thy feasts, Judah, perform thy vows; for the wicked 

1 Mic. 3:4. 
2 5:21, 23, 24. 
■1:16 f. 



Yahweh' s Self -Manifestation 73 

one shall no more pass through thee; he is utterly cut 
off/* 1 

Only ritual observances are necessary to secure Yah- 
weh's favor. Nahum does not use the term "day of Yah- 
weh/ 7 but he describes Yahweh's intervention with all the 
familiar traits of world catastrophe/ and proclaims that 
thus Yahweh will take vengeance upon his enemies, of 
whom Nineveh is chief. The only reason we can see for 
the preservation of this one anti-prophetic book in the Old 
Testament is that within half a dozen years after it was 
composed, Nineveh actually fell, as Nahum had been keen 
enough to foresee. Nahum' s defection seems so much the 
more remarkable when one remembers that he was a 
contemporary of Jeremiah, the most spiritual of the proph- 
ets. His non-moral, anti-prophetic attitude serves to bring 
into stronger relief the ethical progress which the other 
prophets had made, for it shows the difficulties against 
which they had to contend. 3 

During the Exile one prophet strikes a new note. Jere- 
miah and Ezekiel, with practically all the pre-exilic proph- 
ets, regard the disaster which Israel had suffered as a 
just punishment for her sins. Habakkuk, to be sure, 
raises a question. Why should an evil foreign nation be 
allowed to go on continually mistreating righteous Israel ? 4 
But he solves the question in the old way : Yahweh will 

■1:15. This is generally regarded as exilic or postexilic; see J. M. 
P. Smith, "Int. Crit. Com./' Micah, etc., pp. 269, 306 f. The 
criticism of Nahum recorded above is true, even if these verses 
are not his own. 

2 If 1 : 2-8 may be regarded as authentic. 

3 Amos and Hosea prophesy against the northern kingdom. Micah, 

Isaiah, Zephaniah, and Jeremiah against Judah. Whether 
Habakkuk spoke against Assyria or Judah is uncertain, but the 
grounds of judgment are moral, as they are not in Nahum. 
Buttenwieser, Prophets of Israel, p. xxi, says, "The Book of 
Nahum is an example ... of the national chauvinistic pro- 
phecy, the representatives of which the true prophets never 
tired of denouncing," 
* 1:12-17. 



74 The Promise of His Coming 

eventually punish the oppressor. Only Second Isaiah 
strikes out into a new path. He feels that his people 
have suffered beyond their deserts. "She hath received 
of Yahweh's hand double for all her sins. 1 How then 
shall he answer Israel when she complains, "My way is 
hid from Yahweh, and the justice due me is passed away 
from my God" ? 2 He includes in this thought the older 
solutions, that Yahweh has punished them for their sins 3 
and that he will more than recompense them for all their 
sufferings by the glorious abundance and power that 
should be theirs in the new era that was just ahead, and 
he presents these old answers with a beauty and power 
of language that is almost unmatched in the whole Bible. 
But his great contribution to the history of religious 
thought is in his representation of Israel as prepared by 
her humiliation and suffering to become the messenger 
of Yahweh to the nations. 

"Behold, my servant, whom I uphold; my chosen, in 
whom my soul delighteth: I have put my Spirit upon 
him; he will bring forth justice to the Gentiles. He 
will not cry, nor lift up his voice, nor cause it to be heard 
in the street. A bruised reed will he not break, and a 
dimly burning wick will he not quench: he will bring 
forth justice in truth. He will not fail nor be discour- 
aged, till he have set justice in the earth; and the isles 
shall wait for his law." 4 

"Therefore will I divide him a portion with the great, 
and he shall divide the spoil with the strong; because 
he poured out his soul unto death, and was numbered 
with the transgressors : yet he bare the sin of many, and 
made intercession for the transgressors." 5 

This classical statement of the value of vicarious suf- 
fering struck no responsive chord in the hearts of the 

J 40:2. 
2 40:27. 
8 42: 23-25. 
4 42: 1-4. 
6 53: 12. 



The Objects of Yahwelis Wrath 75 

prophet's contemporaries, so far as literature has left us 
evidence. They were glad to listen to his glowing pre- 
dictions of restoration. Perhaps because these were not 
fulfilled, they were slow to accept the new interpreta- 
tion of the meaning of suffering and of the purpose of 
Yahweh in manifesting himself through disaster and 
catastrophe. It bore no fruit till Jesus found in it the 
meaning of his own and all life. 1 



III. The Objects of Yahweh's Wrath 

The prophets' horizons depended upon historical circum- 
stances. The sins of Israel and Judah almost wholly oc- 
cupy the attention of the four earliest prophets. They 
were too much concerned with their great task of giving 
a living, ethical interpretation to religion and especially 
to the current conception of the day of Yahweh, to stop 
to denounce the evils to be found in other nations, unless 
their immediate object demanded it. 2 But the question 
must eventually be answered as to what Yahweh, in his 
great day, would do with all the nations whom, accord- 
ing to the prophetic view, he was now using to punish 
Israel. It was difficult to bring the preprophetic, pop- 
ular expectation of a world catastrophe into consistency 
with the prophetic view of the day of Yahweh as a his- 
torical event. Amos and Isaiah use the language that 
belongs to world catastrophe and speak of Yahweh's pun- 
ishment of other nations without making any connection 
between the two. Zephaniah and Jeremiah make the day 
of Yahweh to include all nations. 

"Therefore wait for me, saith Yahweh, until the day 
that I rise up to the prey; for my determination is to 
gather the nations, that I may assemble the kingdoms, 



1 Cp. G. C. Workman, The Secret of Jehovah (London, 1907); 

Knudson, Relig. Teachings of the OT, pp. 282 ff.; Robinson, 
Relig. Ideas of the OT, pp. 176 f. 

2 It was demanded in Am. 1 and 2 and in Is. 15-18 and 20. 



76 The Promise of His Coming 

to pour upon them mine indignation, even all my fierce 
anger; for all the earth shall be devoured with the 

fire of my jealousy For he will make and end, yea, 

a terrible end, of all them that dwell in the earth." 1 

"A noise shall come even to the end of the earth; 
for Yahweh hath a controversy with the nations; he 
will enter into judgment with all flesh: as for the 
wicked, he will give them to the sword, saith Yahweh." 2 

In this world judgment Judah is included. She must 
suffer for her sins. But the nations that act as the in- 
struments of Yahweh' s wrath must also receive their 
due. 3 

In the earlier prophets judgment is indiscriminate, it 
is pronounced upon the whole people. Religion and 
morality were national affairs for Amos, Hosea, and 
Micah, and the impending punishment is likewise a com- 
munity matter. 4 Yahweh says to Amos, 

"Smite the capitals, that the thresholds may shake; 
and break them in pieces on the head of all of them; 
and I will slay the last of them with the sword: there 
shall not one of them flee away, and there shall not 
one of them escape. Though they dig into ;Sheol, 
thence shall my hand take them; and though they 
climb up to Heaven, thence I will bring them down." 5 

According to Zephaniah, Yahweh says, 

"I will utterly consume all things from off the face 
of the ground. I will consume man and beast . . . 
and I will cut off man from off the face of the ground." 6 



1 Zeph. 3:8 and 1:18, in the last translating erec by "earth." as the 

EW do in 3:8. 
2 Jer. 25:31. 

3 Cp. Zeph. 1:4; 3:1-5; Jer. 1:15; 2:2, etc. 
*Cp. Bade, The OT in the Light of Today, pp. 83 ff.; Knudson, 

Beacon Lights of Prophecy (New York, 1914), pp. 67 f.; Belig. 

Teachings of the OT, pp. 316-350. 
5 9:1 f.; cp. Hos. 9:11-16; Is. 6:11 ff.; Mic. 2:3 ff. 
8 1:2 f.; ep. Jer. 4:25. 



The Objects of Yahiveh's Wrath 77 

Zephaniah, Nahum, and Habakkuk could see little dis- 
crimination on behalf of the righteous by those scourges 
of God, the Scythians, the Medes, and the Chaldeans. 
And the language of world catastrophe, which the proph- 
ets adopted from popular eschatology, left little place 
for any thought of preferential treatment of the true 
worshippers of Yahweh. It appeared that all alike were 
to be overwhelmed with the faithless nation. 

In Isaiah's doctrine of a remnant we first find clearly 
enunciated the expectation that some are to escape the 
great catastrophe. 1 Amos speaks of a remnant that shall 
escape destruction, "as the shepherd rescueth out of the 
mouth of the lion two legs, or a piece of an ear," 2 only 
to emphasize the completeness of the calamity that shall 
ensue. And Isaiah in one place likens those that shall 
remain to the gleanings from the harvest. 3 Elsewhere 
he says, 

"A remnant shall return, 
a remnant of Jacob unto the mighty God. 
Even though thy people be as the sands of the sea, 
a mere remnant of them shall return ; 
destruction is unalterably decreed, 
sweeping in righteousness like a flood. 
For an unalterable decree of destruction 
the Lord, God Sabaoth, shall execute on the whole 
land." 4 

Even the name which Isaiah gave his son, Shear-jashub, 
"a remnant shall return," may have been intended to 
emphasize "remnant" rather than "return." "This name, 

1 Evidences for a belief in the salvation of a remnant in earlier 

Hebrew literature are very slight; I Kg. 19:18; Am. 5:15 (cp. 
"remnant of Baal/' Zeph. 1:4) ; see Gressmann, Ursprung, pp. 
229-238; Knudson, Relig. Teachings of the OT, pp. 335 f.; But- 
tenwieser, Prophets of Israel, pp. 258 ff. 

2 3 : i2. 

8 24:13; 6:11 ff.; 17:4 ff. 

4 10:21 ff., translation quoted from Buttenwieser, Prophets of Israel, 

p. 261. 



78 The Promise of His Coming 

as Marti points out, implies a confirmation rather than 
a denial of the judgment. It signifies, however, that the 
remnant, i. e., the survivors of the judgment, shall become 
converted." 1 Isaiah goes no farther than this, according 
to many scholars, who regard those passages which ex- 
plicitly differentiate between the future lot of the good 
and the bad as later interpolations. Jeremiah, like 
Isaiah, is not clear on this point, except in passages 
which, for various reasons, are considered by many to 
be editorial additions. 2 Yet, even more than Isaiah, 
his outlook implies individual morality and religion and, 
therefore, a discrimination in the objects of Yahweh's 
wrath. 2 

It is not until we reach Ezekiel that we find these 
ideas coming clearly to expression. "The soul that sin- 
neth, it shall die. . . . The righteousness of the righteous 
shall be upon him, and the wickedness of the wicked 
shall be upon him." 4 Accordingly, in Ezekiel's prophe- 
cies more clearly than in any previous writer, we have 
the doctrine of a righteous remnant who shall hear his 
message and profit thereby. To be sure, the whole house 
of Israel is repeatedly characterized as rebellious/' The 
entire nation is to suffer the vengeance of Yahweh, 6 yet 
a remnant shall be saved. 7 There are those who will 
hear the prophet's word, 8 and Yahw T eh will search out 
his own sheep, judging between sheep and sheep. 9 Ezekiel 
thus lays the foundation for that apocalyptic sectarian- 

1 Buttenwieser, op. cit., p. 259; Marti, Da$ Bach Jesaia on ch. 6:3. 

2 Such passages are Is. 1:25, 27 f.; Jer. 31:29-34. It is not at all 

unlikely that the new reading of Israel's eschatology may 
rescue them. 

8 Charles, Eschatology, p. 100 f.; Bade, OT in Light of Today, pp. 

165 f., 277 f. 

*Ez. 18:4-20. The whole chapter is an excellent exposition of in- 
dividual responsibility. 

5 Ez. 2:3; 3:5-8, 27; 5:5 f. 

6 5:8-12. 

7 6 : 8 ; not all are righteous. 
8 3:21:27. 

9 34:12, 17. 



The Objects of Yahweh's Wrath 79 

ism, or class consciousness, which played so important 
a part in later Jewish eschatology. 1 

In the thought of the people the day of Yahweh was 
to come only upon the enemies of Israel. The prophets 
in the beginning declared that its results would be as 
untoward for Israel as for any of their neighbors. They 
go still farther, to say that Yahweh is aiding the As- 
syrians and the Babylonians and the Persians in their 
task of punishment. When at length the punishment was 
carried out in the Exile, while the nations, which had 
sinned as Israel had sinned, and far worse, escaped, 
there was but one conclusion left. The day of Yahweh 
was yet to come upon the other nations. 

As an exile in Babylon, Ezekiel lived through the 
decade from the first captivity (597) to the destruction 
of Jerusalem by the army of Nebuchadnezzar in 586. He 
and his fellow captives were probably, on the whole, well 
off, and Ezekiel could view the sufferings of his country- 
men in Judea with some degree of detachment. From 
the time of his first prophecy in 592, 2 until the fall of 
the city, he declaimed against his people and his land 
with true prophetic vehemence, sometimes vigorously op- 
posed by others of his fellow exiles. 3 Finally events 
vindicated his prevision, and the city was overthrown. 
Then, after Israel had suffered for her sins, Ezekiel has 
a new message. 

"Thus saith the Lord Yahweh: Now will I bring 
back the captivity of Jacob, and have mercy upon the 
whole house of Israel; and I will be jealous for my 
holy name, . . . And they shall know that I am Yahweh 
their God, in that I caused them to go into captivity 
among the nations, and have gathered them unto their 
own land; and I will leave none of them any more 
there ; neither will 1 hide my face any more from them ; 



1 See below, pp. 93 ff., 114. 

a Ez. 1:2. 

3 13:1, 8, 16 L, 23. 



SO The Promise of His Coming 

for I have poured out my Spirit upon the house of 
Israel, saith the Lord Yahweh." 1 

Because the nations have gloried over the misfortunes 
of the city of Yahweh, he turns against them. They 
are to suffer, while Judah prospers in miraculous fash- 
ion. 2 The words of Second Isaiah exactly express the 
feeling; of Ezekiel: 



-*& 



"Comfort ye, comfort ye my people, saith your God. 
Speak ye comfortably to Jerusalem; and cry unto her, 
that her warfare is accomplished, that her iniquity is 
pardoned, that she hath received of Yahweh's hand 
double for all her sins. . . . Awake, awake, stand up, 
Jerusalem, that hast drunk at the hand of Yahweh 
the cup of his wrath. . . . Thus saith thy Lord Yahweh 
. . . Behold, I have taken out of thy hand the cup 
of staggering, even the bowl of the cup of my wrath; 
thou shalt no more drink it again: and I will put it 
into the hand of them that afflict thee." 3 

The ground is here laid for a return to that Jewish 
particularism which appears in some of the later proph- 
ets and apocalyptists. It became the firm belief of the 
leaders of the nation and gave to the people that hardness 
of temper against which Jesus protested and which led 
finally to the great rebellion against Home in which the 
Holy City was destroyed. 

Ezekiel, as we have seen above, 4 believed in a glorious 
future for Israel, to be clouded only by an attack of the 
nations under Gog of the land of Magog. This attack 
was to end in ignominious defeat for their enemies, in 
a new "day of Yahweh." Thus the day of Yahweh be- 
comes a day of wrath only for the enemies of Israel. 
In three particulars, then, Ezekiel returns to the old 

*Ez. 39:25-29. 

2 Ez. 25:3 f., 8 f., 12 f.; 26:2 f. 

3 Is. 40:1 f. ; 51:17-23; cp. the oracles against the nations in Jer. 

45-51. 
* See p. 65. 



After the Day of Yahweh 81 

popular notion of the "day." It is postponed into the 
indefinite f uture, it is made unhistorical and mythological, 
and it is directed only against the enemies of Israel. 

IV. After the Day of Yahweh 

The discussion of the teachings of the pre-exilic proph- 
ets on the subject of the final outcome, when the day of 
wrath had passed, is clouded by uncertainty. In each 
of the four great prophets of the eighth century there are 
passages which paint in glowing terms the future restora- 
tion of the Hebrew nation to power and prosperity. 1 
Many of these passages are regarded by excellent scholars 
as coming from exilic or post-exilic editors of the prophetic 
books. 2 Amos, for example, predicts dooms and only 
doom for his people through his whole prophecy until we 
come to the last eight verses. Then suddenly he begins 
to speak of raising up the tabernacle of David that is 
fallen, rebuilding ruins, bringing back the captivity of 
the people, promising that they shall no more be plucked 
out of their land. Such language seems only intelligible 
in the mouth of one who is living during or after the ruin 
and captivity have come to pass. 

Admitting the possibility of similar additions and inter- 
polations in the other pre-exilic prophets, we must never- 
theless conclude that a considerable portion of the hopeful, 
or "promising" passages are authentic. We have already 
seen that many other nations had harbored such hopes 

1 Am. 9:8-15; Hos. 1:10-2:1; 2:14-23; 3:1-5; 5:15-6:3; 10:12; 11: 
8-11; 13:14a; 14:1-9; Mic. 4-7; Is. 1:24-29; 2:2-4; 4:2-6; 
9:1-7; 11:1-9; 11:10-12:6; 19:18-25. 

2 It is said that these four were prophets solely of doom, regarding 
the day of Yahweh as "very dark and no brightness in it." 
(Am. 5:20). Charles, Eschatology, p. 83 f., admits great un- 
certainty on the subject, but "has elected to follow the conclu- 
sions of the more advanced critics," such as Volz, who dedi- 
cated a book to the subject {Die vorexilische Jahvehprophetie 
u. der Messias, Gottingen, 1897) with entirely negative con- 
clusions. 



82 The Promise of His Coming 

and that they seem to have been a part of popular Hebrew 
eschatology before the time of the literary prophets. If 
the latter reject them, it is not because they are popular, 
but because they are immoral in their effects. But this 
cannot be maintained. Quite the contrary; an ethical 
message which holds out no hope of repentance and par- 
don is unthinkable. 1 In their conception of the purpose 
of the day of Yahweh and the objects of the divine wrath, 
the prophets ethicized the national eschatology. Their con- 
ception of the remnant almost inevitably involved a happy 
future for those who were saved from the storm. It 
seems to me, therefore, that we must go farther than 
Gray in his commentary on Isaiah and say not merely 
that "the belief in a glorious future does not prove a 
passage unauthentic," 2 but rather that the burden of 
proof has been shifted and it must in every case be proved 
on other grounds that the hopeful passage is unauthentic. 3 
The following discussion is based on passages that seem 
to be unassailable. 

In the popular hopes of an age of glorious prosperity 
after the day of Yahweh, the prophets found material 
well fitted for their moral propaganda. But in order 
that the doctrine of the new age might have ethical 
significance, that there might be in its promise any lure 
away from the existing evil conditions of society toward 
a righteous social order, they were compelled to eliminate 
the popular idea of a cosmic catastrophe as ushering in 
the Age of Gold, and interpret the day of Yahweh as a 
historical event, a social catastrophe, while to the popular 

2 E. L. Curtis, Am. Journal of TheoL, IV 4 (Oct., 1900), p. 829, "A 
prophet of Jehovah preaching a hopeless message is to us a 
contradiction." 

2 "Int. Crit. Com/', Isaiah I xciv ff. 

8 On the radical side see Harper, "Int. Crit. Com.", "Amos and Hosea, 
pp. cxlvii, clix ff. ; Marti, Dodekapropheton, p. 9 f . ; H. P. Smith, 
Religion of Israel, pp. 144 f., 161 ; more "conservative" are 
Steuernagel, Einleitung in das Alte Testament (Tubingen, 1912), 
and Horton and Whitehouse, The Minor Prophets and Isaiah 
in the "New Century Bible." 



After the Day of YaJiweh 83 

nope ox material prosperity they added their ideals of 
righteousness. If Isaiah adopts the popular mythological 
expectation of a transformation of nature which should 
render even the wolf and the leopard and the adder friendly 
to man/ he believes that man also must be transformed. 
Yahweh says, 

"Wash you, make you clean; put away the evil of 
your doings from before mine eyes. . . . Though your 
sins be as scarlet, they shall be as white as snow; though 
they be red like crimson, they shall be as wool. . . . 
I will turn my hand upon thee, and thoroughly purge 
away thy dross, and will take away all thy sin." 2 

This same idea, that man must be transformed before 
he can enjoy the new order, underlies the famous "new 
covenant" passage in Jeremiah, the spirituality and ap- 
positeness of which made it so attractive and useful to 
Xew Testament writers. 

"Behold, the days come, saith Yahweh, that I will 
make a new covenant with the house of Israel, and 
with the house of Judah. ... I will put my law 
in their inward parts, and in their heart will I write 
it." 3 

Whether these passages may be ascribed to Isaiah and 
Jeremiah or not, they are sufficient evidence that there 
were seers in ancient Israel who understood the relation 
of spiritual to social progress and to whom the day of 
Yahweh meant, not an outward and mechanical inter- 
position, but an inner and spiritual change. 

Though the prophets use the language of popular 
mythology, we are not to suppose that they thought the age 
to follow the day of Yahweh would be literally like the 
ancient Paradise. We have to reckon here with oriental 
hyperbole. Many an Egyptian and Babylonian writer 

1 11:6-9. 

3 Is. 1:16, 18, 25; cp. Ez. 36:25 ff. 

8 Jer. 31:81, 33; cp. Lk. 22:20; I Co. 11:25; II Co. 3:6, Heb. 8:6-13. 



84 The Promise of His Coming 

ascribes to the newly enthroned monarch all possible di- 
vine qualities, and proclaims him as the one who will 
bring about a return to Edenic conditions. 1 We must 
make due allowance for courtly flattery in the psalms 
and the prophets. 2 Yet it is evident that these writers 
believed in the possibility of realizing social righteous- 
ness upon all the earth in the reign of some future scion 
of the Davidic house, who would also be a real son of 
God. We cannot be wrong in thinking that the concep- 
tion which Hosea, Isaiah, and Micah had of the future 
age is indicated by their criticism of the social evils of 
their own generation. Just as the prophets down to 
Second Isaiah give their attention to developing the 
ethical content and universal scope of the day of Yahweh, 
so do they also to the new age that should succeed it. 

That Israel's hopes for the future centered exclusively 
around some individual, some messiah, we must not sup- 
pose. 3 Contrary to the modern popular idea, the messiah 
played no essential part in the Hebrew hope of the future. 
From the earliest times the Israelite had thought of God 
as his king, as did his neighbors. 4 It does not appear 
that the human king was regarded as in any sense a rival 
of Yahweh, but rather as his representative, until the 
kings proved themselves oppressive and incapable and 
thus roused dissatisfaction and revolt. Since, however, 
there developed a strong sense of the contrast between 
Yahweh and the gods of the surrounding nations, espe- 
cially Moloch, whose very name means "king," there 
was a tendency in Israel to drop the title in referring 
to Yahweh. It occurs very rarely before the Exile. 

To one who believed in the Davidic dynasty, as the 

1 See Gressmann, TJ r sprung 9 pp. 250-259 ; and above pp. 57 f . 

2 Ps. 2:6-9; 72; Is. 9:6 f.; 11:1-5. 

3 The use of "messianic" to describe the hopes of the Hebrews per- 
petuates this misapprehension. "Eschatological" may sound 
pedantic to the layman, but it is much more accurate. 

* Robinson, Religious Ideas of the OT, 193 ff. 



After the Day of Yahweh 85 

Judean prophets did, it was most natural that the future 
age of glory and righteousness should be thought of as 
under the rule of some member of the royal house. Mak- 
ing allowance for the flattery of "court style/' the lan- 
guage of Isaiah 4:2; 9:6 f . ; 11:1-10, is entirely possible 
to the prophet who could in his old age proclaim the in- 
violability of Jerusalem, 1 and who was probably a 
favorite in the court of the righteous king, Hezekiah. So 
also Jeremiah, who had lived through the reign of Jo- 
siah, could use effectively his faith in the "righteous 
Branch" who should be raised up unto David to darken by 
way of contrast his picture of the wickedness of Josiah's 
sons. 2 This expected ideal king has no connection with 
the superhuman messiah of later apocalyptic literature. 
Allowing for prophetic imagination and court style, we 
need find nothing in these passages that points to more 
than the hope that a descendant worthy of David would 
eventually arise to bring about all the reforms that the 
prophets had expected and urged, as Hezekiah and Josiah 
had in part at least attempted to do. 3 The prophets be- 
lieved that after the great judgment and purification of 
the day of Yahweh, this would be entirely possible. 

Other prophets, whose contact with the royal adminis- 
tration had been less fortunate, took a different view of 
the situation. Some, like Amos and Micah, address their 
complaints in general against the leaders and rulers, the 
aristocracy, of every sort, without specific criticism. 
Some, like Hosea, 4 thought of the kingship as a punish- 
ment upon a nation that had turned away from Yahweh. 
This is the attitude reflected in the secondary account of 

1 Is. 37. 

2 Jer. 23:1-8. 

8 Gressmann, loc. cit., does not seem to me to prove his thesis that 

a superhuman messiah was in the mind of Isaiah in chaps. 

7, 9, and 11. 
4 13:11. 



86 The Pro?nise of His Coming 

the establishment of Saul as king/ where he is repre- 
sented as usurping Yahweh's place. In Ezekiel Yahweh 
says, "My servant David shall be king over them, . . . 
their prince forever." 2 Yet his constitution for the 
Utopia that was to arise in Judea after the Exile makes 
the government thoroughly sacerdotal, with the prince a 
mere appendage or servant to the priest. 3 Here again 
Ezekiel stands as the first representative of new tendencies 
that were to prevail in post-exilic Judaism, which, claim- 
ing to be a theocracy, was in reality, of course, a hieroc- 
racy. 

Over against the hope of a rejuvenation of the Davidic 
line, there stands, therefore, the conception of God alone 
as king in Israel. This idea, implicit in Israel's religion 
before the Exile, comes to the fore with the decline and 
downfall of the royal line. The phrase "kingdom of 
God," to be sure, is not found in the Old Testament, but 
in exilic and postexilic times the idea becomes more and 
more prominent. Not the least important evidence of 
its development is to be found in Second Isaiah. The 
Davidic line is not once referred to. Instead, 

"Behold, the Lord Yahweh will come as a mighty 
one, and his arm will rule for him: Behold, his re- 
ward is with him, and his recompense before him. 
. . . Thus saith Yahweh, your Eedeemer, the Holy 
One of Israel: ... I am Yahweh, your Holy One, 
the Creator of Israel, your King." 4 

One might readily suppose such lines to be written 
in intentional opposition to a scheme for the re-enthrone- 
ment of Zerubbabel, or some other royal prince. 5 So 
far from a Davidic messiah being expected, Cyrus is Yah- 

*I Sam. 8; 10:17-27; 12; cp. Jud. 8:22 f. Such passages belong to 
Hosea's century or later. 

2 37:24 f. 

3 Ez. 40-48. 

4 Is. 40:10; 43:14, 15; cp. 41:21. 

5 See below, pp. 90 f. 



The Prophetic Contribution 87 

Yahweh's servant par excellence is 
Israel as a group; there is nowhere a reference to any 
individual Israelite as ruler or leader of that group. 
Yahweh's servant Israel, purified through his sufferings, 
is to bring all the earth to know Yahweh as king and to 
rejoice in the freedom and glory of his government of the 
earth. 2 Thus Second Isaiah believes that the day of 
Yahweh is passed and that the new age is already begun, 
with its new mission for Israel. If all Israel had really 
been purified by the fires of exilic suffering and had been 
able to take his richly spiritual view of the coming of 
Yahweh's kingdom, his vision might in a certain sense 
have been realized. But the fullness of the time had not 
yet come. He had no real successor. We have to go 
on to study the devious windings of Jewish eschatology 
during the five centuries that intervened before the com- 
ing of Jesus. 

V. The Prophetic Contribution 

The prophetic contribution, then, to the Hebrew doc- 
trine of the future was manifold. From one standpoint 
the great work of Israel's seers was the reinterpretation 
of popular eschatology in the light of morality and his- 
tory. They brought the day of Yahweh down out of the 
dim twilight of mythology into the daylight of history. 
They made it a matter of morality rather than of un- 
thinking patriotism. It was to be a time of punishment 
for Israel, a vindication, not of Israel, but of Yahweh, a 
revelation, not of their greatness, but of his power and 
righteousness. 3 In trying to understand its purpose and 
results, some of them at least were led to a new conception 
of individual religion and moral responsibility on the one 
hand, and pf Yahweh's relation to the whole of mankind 
on the other. With the development in Jeremiah and 

1 44:28; 45:1. 

2 42: 5-9. 

8 Ez. 36:22-31. 



88 The Promise of His Coming 

Ezekiel of the conception of individual, as over against 
collective, morality, the idea came to the fore that only 
the purified remnant of Israel would escape the destruction 
of the day of Yahweh. With the development of mono- 
theism came the belief that Yahweh would discriminate 
between the righteous and the wicked of other nations also, 
and that all the good, of whatever nation, would share in 
the glories of the new age. 

Finally one great prophet at least came to see in the 
Exile not merely a punishment for sin, but also a prepa- 
ration for service to the whole world. In their efforts 
to peer beyond the great catastrophe into the new era that 
should follow, two opposite, but not contradictory, ideas 
came to the surface, the anticipation of a renewed king- 
dom of David, and the hope of a real reign of God on 
earth. Thus the prophets prepared the way for the be- 
lief in God as an immanent spiritual presence guiding the 
affairs of history and filling the hearts of men. 



CHAPTEE IV 

NEW PKOBLEMS AND NEW SOLUTIONS 

L Disappointed Hopes: Politics and 
Apocalypticism 

THEIR history during the six centuries following the 
Exile brought out the prophetic spirits in Judaism 1 a 
constant succession of new problems. The situation at the 
end of the Exile made for the dreaming of dreams. Just 
as men expected a new era after the Napoleonic wars, 2 
just as during the latter years of the great war now at an 
end we looked forward to a glorious period of reconstruc- 
tion, so the faithful remnants of the true worshippers 
of Yahweh who outlived the destruction of Jerusalem and 
the deportation to Babylon looked for a restoration after 
"seventy years," which should more than compensate for 
all they had suffered. 3 

Ezekiel is to proclaim to the people, 

"Thus saith the Lord Yahweh: ... I will take 
you from among the nations, and gather you out of 
all the countries, and will bring you into your own 
land. And I will sprinkle clean water upon you, and 
ye shall be clean: from all your filthiness, and from 
all your idols, will I cleanse you. A new heart also 
will I give you, and a new spirit will I put within you. 
. . . And ye shall dwell in the land that I gave to 
your fathers. . . . And I will call for the grain, and 

ir The term "Judaism" is used to distinguish the postexilic civili- 
zation of the race, and Hebrew for the preexilic. 
2 See above, p. 4 f . 
a See Jer. 25 : 11 f . ; 29 : 10 ; Is. 23 : 15, 17. 

89 



90 The Promise of His Coming 

will multiply it. . . . And I will multiply the fruit 
of the tree, and the increase of the field, that ye may 
receive no more the reproach of famine among the 
nations." 1 

More than that, as the "suffering servant" of Yahweh, 
Israel had borne the griefs and carried the sorrows of 
the world. Now God will divide her a portion with the 
great, and she shall divide the spoil with the strong. She 
will not fail nor be discouraged till she have set justice 
in the earth, and the isles shall wait for her law. 2 Such 
was the glorious vision of world-wide service which God 
put into the heart of the Great Unknown, the most "evan- 
gelical" of the Old Testament prophets. The overthrow 
and humiliation of her archenemy Babylon, prophesied 
in Is. 13, 14 and Jer. 50, 51 as Cyrus began his victo- 
rious career, seemed to promise a new era. These political 
disturbances could bring only advantage and enlargement 
to the little nations suffering under the heel of Babylonian 
oppression. As Assyria and Babylonia had come "out 
of the north" to punish Israel for her sins, so Persia 
came to restore her, now purified by suffering, to her 
rightful position of leadership. 

How miserably the little community in Judea after the 
Return failed to realize these magnificent ideals! We 
cannot understand the development of Jewish expecta- 
tions of the coming of the messianic kingdom without ob- 
serving the effect upon it of the nation's political fortunes. 
The whole period from the Return in 538 B. 0. to the 
rebellion of Bar-Cochba in 135 A. D. may be best under- 
stood as a succession of disappointed hopes. The expecta- 
tions of the returning exiles, which had probably been 
moulded by Ezekiel's elaborate theocratic Utopia, may be 
seen clearly reflected in Second Isaiah. Twenty years 
later, as Haggai and Zechariah show us, these expecta- 
tions had not been at all realized, yet, on the occasion of 

*Ez. 36:22-31. 

2 Is. 53:4, 12; 42:4. 



Politics and Apocalypticism 91 

the disturbances which closed Cambyses' reign, they blaze 
up again as ardent as before. Even the Temple had not 
been rebuilt. 1 Yet these prophets are animated by a 
new hope : Joshua, the son of Jehozadak, the high priest, 
and Zerubbabel, the son of Shealtiel, the governor of 
Judea, are two anointed ones under whom the glories of 
David's kingdom are to be revived. 2 Did the heavy hand 
of a Persian satrap crush these ambitions before they 
blossomed? We do not know, but Malachi, Ezra, and 
Nehemiah show how far they came from realization. Ezra 
and Nehemiah introduced the Law, hoping thereby to 
prepare Israel for her glorious mission; but again there 
came no transformation in the outward conditions of the 
nation. How often during the next two hundred and 
fifty years the national hopes flamed up, history has not 
recorded. Probably each generation could tell its tale 
of uprisings. 

Yet, outwardly, there never came a time, from the 
Return in 538 to the Maccabean uprising in 168 B. C, 
when any ambitious expectation on the part of the Jews 
would seem to have been justified. The city was small 
and without military, commercial, or political importance. 
In spite of the fact that, much of the time, civil and ec- 
clesiastical power centered in the high priest as the head 
of the nation and its representative in all foreign affairs, 
the Temple was insignificant and unattractive, the worship 
of Yahweh frequently neglected, and the pious Jews who 
kept the Law were few, and had to suffer, not only from 
the heathen round about, but also from the rich and pow- 
erful among their compatriots, who were usually ungodly. 

This inglorious period was brought to a close by the 
efforts of Antiochus Epiphanes, their Syrian over-lord, 
to blot out the Jewish racial and religious distinctiveness. 

^lohler, Jewish Theology (New York, 1918), p. 373, refers Ps. 80: 

15 f.; 74 (?) ; 89:40-40, to this time of disappointment. 
2 Hag. 2:1-9, 20-23; Zech. 3-4: 6:9-15; see Kent, Makers and Teach- 
ers of Judaism ("Historical Bible," New York, 1911), pp. 50 f. 



92 The Promise of His Coming 

His persecutions brought about tbe revolt of the priest 
Mattathias and his three sons, Judas Maccabeus, Jona- 
than, and Simon, whose sufferings and exploits constitute 
this period one of the most glorious in the whole history 
of the race. Simon's son, John Hyrcanus, was hailed by 
enthusiastic admirers as prophet, priest, and king, and 
thus combining all the highest of the age-long ideals of 
his people. 1 To many it appeared that the sufferings of 
the pious in the persecutions of Antiochus and the wars 
for freedom had actually fulfilled the ancient prophecies 
of the woes of the day of Tahweh, and that now the new 
age had begun. But the next two generations of the dy- 
nasty showed such unendurable cruelty and despotism, or 
such puerile weakness, that its representatives were hailed 
as monsters that devoured the people. 2 Their reigns 
seemed to be ushering in the last woes rather than the 
messianic age, for they persecuted and slaughtered the 
righteous Pharisees. When, at length, their jealousies 
and quarrels and incapacity brought about the Roman con- 
quest and the rule of the Idumean Antipater and his son 
Herod, the execration of the pious knew no bounds. No 
effort to realize the national hopes could have begun more 
splendidly, none could have failed more ignominiously. 
With the Maccabean fiasco in mind, it is easy to appre- 
ciate the situation of official Judaism in Jesus' day. After 
such a lesson no pious and thoughtful Jew could expect 
the kingdom of God to come by military or political meas- 
ures. The logic of events, the bitterness of repeated dis- 
appointments, drove them for an hundred years to complete 
distrust of human efforts. If the kingdom of God was 
to be realized on earth, it must be by some entirely super- 
natural interference with the course of history. Belong- 
ing mainly to the middle and upper classes of society 

Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs; Levi, 8:11-15; 18:2-13; Jose- 
phus, Antiquities, xiii 10, 7; Wcvr i 2, 8; Charles, Book of 
Jubilees, p. 187. 

2 Test. XII Patr., Judah 21:7; 22:1 f. 



Politics and Apocalypticism 93 

and being therefore fairly comfortable, the Pharisees did 
not feel keenly the pressure of political oppression and 
social injustice. It is a significant fact that no reference 
to the kingdom of God has been handed down from any 
Jewish rabbi of the time of Jesus. They were interested 
in the law, not in the coming of a new day. The Sad- 
ducee, likewise, was satisfied with the status quo, just as 
is the modern politician, so long as nothing interferes 
with his perquisites. As is usually the case, it was among 
the lower-middle and under classes that the sense of social 
wrongs and the passion for reform made itself felt. 

It was most natural that the longing for social justice 
should find its means of expression in the apocalyptic 
movement. The prophets had proclaimed the coming of 
the terrible day of Yahweh to punish the nation for its 
sins against the poor and the needy, the widow and the 
fatherless. 1 All through the dark days after the Exile 
the pious had suffered from the oppression, not merely of 
their heathen neighbors, but also, and perhaps more bit- 
terly, from their own unscrupulous fellow-countrymen. 
Again and again in the Psalms they voice their complaint 
and cry to Yahweh for relief. 

"Why standest thou afar off, Yahweh? 
Why hidest thou thyself in times of trouble? 
In the pride of the wicked the poor is hotly pursued. 



He sitteth in the lurking-places of the villages; 
In the secret places doth he murder the innocent. 

He lieth in wait to catch the poor. 

And the helpless fall by his strong ones. 

Arise, Yahweh; God, lift up thy hand: 



1 Am. 2:6; 4:1; 5:7; Is. l:16f.; Mic. 2:lf.; 8f.; 3:1-4; Jer. 7:5ff. 
5:28; Ez. 18:5-18; 22:7, 29; Mai. 3:5. 



94 The Promise of His Coming 

Forget not the poor. 

Break thou the arm of the wicked. 

Yahweh, thou hast heard the desire of the meek: 
Thou wilt prepare their heart, thou wilt cause thine 

ear to hear; 
To judge the fatherless and the oppressed, 
That man who is of the earth may be terrible no 

more." 1 

The Psalms of Solomon, written probably a generation 
before the birth of Jesus, complain continually of the 
"sinners" who assail the "righteous" in their insolence, 
but express the fullest confidence that God cares for the 
latter and will eventually "raise up unto them their king, 
the son of David," who will rule in righteousness to the 
destruction of their enemies and the great good fortune of 
Israel. 2 Likewise the Assumption of Moses, written dur- 
ing the lifetime of Jesus, complains that the rulers of 
Israel, probably the Sadducees, are "destructive and im- 
pious . . . treacherous men, self-pleasers, gluttons, 
gourmands . . . devourers of the goods of the poor, say- 
ing that they do so on the grounds of their justice." 3 

The apocalyptic movement in Judaism, then, was in 
opposition to the officials of the nation. The language we 
have just quoted, as well as the character of their beliefs, 
shows that the Sadducees had no sympathy with it. Offi- 
cial Pharisaism is also excluded by the nature of its inter- 
ests 4 and by the absence of any evidence of their attention 
to the matter. It was among the people, suffering under 
the misgovernment and economic exploitation of their for- 

*Ps. 10:1-18, accord to Briggs ("Int. Crit. Com.", Psalms I 68 ff.), 
originally a prayer for rescue from foreign oppressors, of the 
Persian period. See also Ps. 37; 43; 107:39-42; 109:21-31; 
113:5-8; 147:2-6. 

2 See especially chap. 17. 

•7:1-6. 

* See below, pp. 140 ff. 



Politics and Apocalypticism 95 

eign over-lords and Sadducean or Herodian rulers, that 
fertile soil was found for the development of the spirit 
of discontent and revolution. As in Latin countries dis- 
satisfaction finds vent in armed revolution, in Russia in 
soviet government, in English speaking countries in con- 
ventions, resolutions, and elections, so among the Jews 
the one natural expression was in apocalyptic movements. 

Men whp are suffering deeply find it hard to wait for 
God's own good time. They tend to believe that, if they 
match their prayers with effort, God will the sooner in- 
tervene. And so there were among the Jews constantly 
increasing unrest and numerous popular uprisings under 
pretended messiahs — the so-called Zelotic movements, al- 
ways opposed by the Sadducees and Pharisees and put 
down by Rome with an iron hand. Official Judaism re- 
jected the social question; 1 with it they rejected and tried 
to suppress its chief expression, the apocalyptic movement. 

In A. D. 66 the inevitable happened. Pure repression 
without constructive statesmanship worked its customary 
result. Goaded by a series of tactless, incompetent, or 
cruel and rapacious procurators, the people put their 
theology to the test. The limit of endurance had been 
reached; God must intervene to save his people. Popular 
sentiment swept even many of the Pharisees into the 
great revolt against Rome. It would seem that the ter- 
rible defeat which the nation suffered, the destruction of 
the city and Temple and the cessation of the sacrifices, 
would have convinced the most bigoted that the political 
type of messianic hope was entirely mistaken. No doubt 
many did learn the lesson. Yet a generation later the 
Jews of the Diaspora rose against Rome — and were sav- 
agely punished. Again, after another short generation, 

a L. Wallis, Sociological Sudy of the Bible (Chicago, 1912), pp, 
218 ff. This judgment is not touched by the excellent, but 
meager sayings of Hillel, cp. Kent, Social Teachings of the 
Prophets and Jesus (New York, 1917), pp. 166 ff.; contrast 
John the Baptist. 



96 The Promise of His Coming 

under an adventurer who called himself Bar-Cochba, "son 
of the star," and who was hailed by the great Rabbi 
Akiba as messiah, there came another Jewish revolt, as 
bitter and as severely punished as that of 66-70. It was 
the last, dying gasp; hereafter official Judaism, as repre- 
sented by the rabbis and the Talmud, gave up political 
ambitions entirely, dreamed little of the return of the 
Golden Age, and saw few millennial visions. Suffering, 
hope, disappointment, these three words, repeated again 
and again, record the history of Judaism from the Exile 
to Bar-Cochba. To this period of almost continual suf- 
fering, of alternate hope and despair, belong the Jewish 
visions and revelations that prepared for Jesus' proclama- 
tion of the coming kingdom of God. 

Apocalyptic literature is at once the cause and the 
product of these disappointed hopes. On the one hand 
it held out the promise of an impossible ideal future, a 
promise sworn by God himself. The tragic consequences 
of this hope are seen in the three great Jewish uprisings 
against Borne and the countless minor ones. On the 
other hand, these books were the outcome of despair. 
They were written to hearten a people that was suffering 
to the limit of endurance, to promise them that their 
tortures should last but a little longer, to encourage them 
to hold out to the end, when God would intervene to pun- 
ish their oppressors and give them all that heart could 
wish. They come, not out of times of prosperity and 
peace, but of war and disturbance. 1 Some are stormy 
petrels, omens of coming disaster, others are the vultures 
that gloat and gorge as the evil passes over the land. 
Apocalypticism was a counsel of despair. 

Such was the relation of political history to the de- 
velopment of apocalypticism. We turn now to study the 
effect of the religious development of Judaism upon its 
eschatology. 
1 See above, p. 5, quotation from Dewey. , 



The Effect of Religious Development 97 

II. The Effect of their Keligious Development 
Upon the Hopes of the Jews 

As to the inner development of Judaism during this 
period, that is, the development of its moral and religious 
thinking, the details are obscure, but certain great facts 
stand out as the arches of the bridge of the centuries. 
The most significant of these are the canonization of the 
Law and of the whole Old Testament, and the develop- 
ment of the eschatological hope. Around these two com- 
plementary ideas, the Law and the coming kingdom, cen- 
ters practically all the literature which has been preserved 
from this period. We are concerned with the literature 
that has to do with the coming kingdom; but we must 
note how the canonization of the Law affected both the 
form and content of apocalyptic literature. 

After a most interesting history, Jewish law crystalized 
into the form which we find in the Pentateuch, the first 
five books of the Bible, 1 about 450 B. C. Under the 
priestly influence of Ezra and others like him, with the 
aid of such lay administrators as Nehemiah and prophets 
like Malachi, the Law, substantially as we now have it, 
was forced upon the Jewish communities in Egypt, Baby- 
lonia, and Palestine in the latter part of the fifth century 
before Christ. 2 The^e five books were thought to contain 
a sufficient and authoritative revelation of the will of 
God. The one duty of the true Israelite was to study 
and understand it fully and obey it unreservedly. There- 
fore scribism gave itself unremittingly to the interpreta- 
tion and inculcation of the Law, and the Jewish people 

1 See the discussions of the Pentateuch or Hexateuch in the Intro- 

ductions of Driver, McFadyen, Gray, and others. 

2 In proof of this we have the accounts of Ezra-Nehemiah, written 

a century or so later on the basis of personal memoirs, now 
remarkably attested by contemporary documents in the Aramic 
papyri from Elephantine. See Meyer, Das Papyrusfund von 
Elephantine, (Leipzig, 1912), pp. 67-75, Robinson, Relig. Ideas 
of the OT, p. 137, n. 1. 



98 The Promise of His Coming 

for the most part accepted the scribes as their religious 
teachers. 1 It was quite a lawyer-like reverence for the 
small technicalities of law which gave to Pharisaic legalism 
those characteristics which Jesus so unsparingly criticized, 
Jewish legalism was fundamentally incapable of grasping 
the great social and religious ideals of the Prophets and 
was thus constitutionally, although unwittingly, opposed to 
the larger hope of the coming kingdom. 

The greater part, and the best part, of the Old Testa- 
ment was written before the acceptance of the Law under 
Ezra. During the next three hundred years the remainder 
was written, and the whole received its present form. 
During this period also a definite doctrine of inspiration 
arose. It was generally agreed that "prophecy never came 
by human impulse, it was when carried away by the holy 
Spirit that the holy men of God spoke," and that "all 
scripture is inspired by God." 2 It was also generally 
agreed that God had given his message to the world 
through the ancient lawgivers and prophets, and that the 
Spirit no longer spoke to men. The prophetic voice was 
stilled. So sure is the anonymous writer of Zechariah 13 
of this (about 200 B. C.) that he believes that any one 
who claims to prophesy is a deceiver, and suggests that 
"his father and his mother that begat him shall thrust 
him through when he prophesieth." 3 About 200 B. C. the 
prophetic canon was closed. Judaism is no longer a 
living faith, but a book religion ; even Daniel receives new 
revelations by the study of ancient prophets. 4 

Accordingly, it was believed that only books which had 
come down from the ancients, from the times when God 
still spoke to men, were really inspired. While there 
was fair unanimity in the opinion that those we now 

1 Charles, Religious Development between the Old and New Testa- 
ments (New York, n. d.), pp. 39 f. 
2 II Pt. 1:21; II Ti. 3:16. 
3 V. 3; cp. I Mac. 4:46; 9:27. 
*Dan. 9:1 f. 



The Effect of Religious Development 99 

have in the Old Testament belong in this category, there 
were many other writings, some of them short fugitive 
pieces, some of them large books, which seemed to many 
to have equal claim to a place in the sacred literature of 
the race. On the whole, the Jewish people dealt wisely, 
though somewhat blindly, with these difficult questions, and 
we have reason to be grateful that they selected so much, 
and omitted so little that was good. The most serious 
error in their principles of selection was this, that only 
the ancient was believed to be inspired. The inevitable 
result of this conception of inspiration was that new ideas, 
as such, were denied a hearing. No one dared to claim 
to exercise the prophetic gift, or to speak in the name of 
Yahweh. From Zechariah (B. C. 520) to Jesus there 
are, I believe, only two pieces of Palestinian Jewish lit- 
erature the names of whose authors are known: Joel, 
about whom we know nothing else, and Jesus ben-Sira, 
whose book never got into the canon. The scribe of these 
times thus again found himself denied any active partici- 
pation in the apocalyptic movement, while prophetic spirits 
w r ould consciously or unconsciously find themselves out of 
sympathy with scribism and Pharisaism. 

The development of Judaism was profoundly influenced 
by foreign civilizations. There never had been a time 
when the nation was completely isolated. But from the 
time of Ahaz, when it was caught in the maelstrom of 
world politics, this unique little people had to measure 
itself continually with the far richer and more imposing 
arts, sciences, literatures, philosophies, and religions of 
Babylonia, Persia, Egypt, and Greece. Being so much 
the poorer, it must borrow heavily and develop its own 
resources along lines either analogous or antagonistic to 
the ideas it met. In some instances it took the one atti- 
tude, in some the other. Prom the highly developed demon- 
ology, eschatology, and astrology of Babylonia and Persia 
the Jew borrowed many beliefs and practices, and espe- 
cially the myths and other forms in which these ex* 



100 The Promise of His Coming 

pressed themselves. But that any of these superstitions 
were taken over and planted for the first time in virgin 
soil in the minds of the Jews of this age, we are not for 
a moment to suppose. As we have seen, there is suf- 
ficient evidence that there had been in preprophetic times 
a considerable body of myths regarding the day of Yahweh 
as a great world catastrophe and the return after it of 
the Golden Age, just as there were many survivals of 
ancient animism. The great prophetic leaders of the 
Hebrews kept these weeds down or modified their growth, 
until the tropical showers of Babylonian and Persian 
myths, accompanied by the loss of the prophetic spirit in 
Judaism, made them spring up until they almost hid the 
real grain. Jewish apocalypticism was a development of 
the old preprophetic views under the influence of these 
foreign civilizations. 

'No social movement fails to generate reactions. The 
legalism of Ezra and IsTehemiah, well-intentioned as it 
was, constituted a reversion to the preprophetic trust in 
sacrifices and offerings. Apocalypticism was in part a 
protest. Yet, as we have just said, the influence of the 
religions of Babylonia and Persia tended to cause the 
apocalyptists to return to the preprophetic standpoint, for 
the foreign faiths represented much the same beliefs and 
practices as the old popular religion in Israel. When, in 
the third and second centuries, Greek influence became 
dominant, the nation at first accepted good and bad to- 
gether, and, when with the Maccabees the great reaction 
against Hellenism set in, good and bad were rejected togeth- 
er. Except as represented by the Return and the exclusive- 
ness of Ezra and Nehemiah, we know of no such reaction 
against oriental influences, partly because Judaism was 
itself oriental, partly because no monarch tried to force 
orientalism upon it as Antiochus Epiphanes did Hellen- 
ism. The net result of Pharisaic hatred for Greece and 
Rome was to make Judaism inhospitable toward all that 
was strange in western civilization, but to open the doors 



Jewish, Visions and Revelations 101 

to the demonological superstitions and the eschatological 
myths of popular Greek religion, which were fundament- 
ally like those of the orient, for they were, indeed, partly 
oriental in origin. When one considers this combination 
of evil influences and the natural antipathy of legalism 
to much that is best in the apocalyptic literature, one 
wonders that, nevertheless, it was the agency which pre- 
vented the ancient prophetic spirit from dying out until 
Christianity came to revive it. 

III. Jewish Visions and Eevelations 

On account, then, of these developments, especially the 
growing absorption of the nation in the study and ob- 
servance of the Law and the conviction that God no 
longer spoke to men, the Jewish prophet of the time was 
compelled to put his ideas in writing and publish them 
anonymously, or, if he wished to be sure that large circles 
would heed them, to attach to them the name of some 
ancient saint, just as the Law was ascribed to Moses, the 
psalms to David, and wisdom literature to Solomon. That 
this literary falsification was conscious and intentional we 
cannot aver. 1 Much of the material that was used by the 
prophets of future woe and weal was borrowed from 
popular tradition, as we have seen in previous chapters, 
and may have been already circulating under ancient 
names. In any case, that age had not developed a sense of 
literary property. Whatever the extenuating circum- 
stances, the fact is beyond dispute. 

This anonymity or pseudonymity, the lack of the au- 
thor's name or the ascription of a false name, is one of 
the distinctive marks of all the Jewish visions and revela- 
tions of this period. No living teacher dared claim the 
spirit of prophecy. Not until the messianic age would 
it return. 2 Daniel was commanded significantly to "shut 

1 Cp. Oesterley, Apocrypha, p. 200. 

2 Charles, Religious Development, pp. 43 f. 



102 The Promise of His Coming 

up the words, and seal the book, even to the time of the 
end/' 1 but, according to the Christian apocalypse, "the 
lion that is of the tribe of Judah, the Eoot of David, 
hath overcome to open the book and the seven seals there- 
of/' 2 The Christian dispensation comes to fulfill the 
words of the older apocalyptist Joel, "And it shall come 
to pass afterward, that I will pour out my spirit upon 
all flesh; and your sons and your daughters shall proph- 
esy." 3 Then the Christian apocalyptist, instead of con- 
juring up some worthy of the past, dares speak in his 
own proper person, "I John, your brother and partaker 
with you in the tribulation and kingdom and patience 
which are in Jesus." 4 

The fact that the prophets of Judaism dared no longer 
speak out as such to their contemporaries made it necessary 
for them to adopt new literary types and forms. That 
which approved itself to the taste of the age is technically 
known as the "apocalypse," or revelation, because in it 
history, past and future, is portrayed under the guise of 
visions. Although they differ greatly among themselves, 
Daniel in the Old Testament and Revelation in the New 
are sufficiently characteristic to give a correct conception 
of the whole class. Instead of poems, addresses, and 
visions which concern themselves quite clearly with the 
immediate circumstances of the speaker and his hearer, 
as in the prophets, we find here a series of visions of 
the most bizarre and grotesque sort, which must later be 
interpreted to the seer by some heavenly messenger and 
which, even when so interpreted, are often more or less 
unintelligible to us. Animals often take the places of men 

1 Dan. 12:4, 9. 

2 Rev. 5:5. 

3 Joel 2:28; Ac. 2:17. 

4 Rev. 1:9. The book does not indicate what John was intended, 

for the readers well knew. Possibly the writer was John the 
son of Zebedee. In that case some other John wrote the Fourth 
Gospel and the first epistle. 



Development of Apocalyptic Literature 103 

in these nightmares; sheep stand for the Jewish people, 
who in this age are well symbolized as a helpless and 
harried flock; beasts, rams, and he-goats stand for the 
nations that oppress Israel, their horns typifying particu- 
lar kings or princes; the men of these visions are angels 
who carry God's messages and execute his will like a 
king's soldiers; and the dragons are demonic powers of 
evil arrayed against God, his angels, and his people. 1 It 
is this strange literature that records the hopes of Judaism. 
It includes the forerunners and models of our New Testa- 
ment Book of Revelation. 



IV. The Rise aistd Development of Apocalyptic 
Literature 

The writers of these strange and sometimes repulsive 
symbolical visions were the direct and legitimate descend- 
ants of the great Old Testament prophets. How it came 
about that they selected this peculiar type of literature 
we cannot say wdth certainty. We cannot suppose they 
report actual experiences. Their visions are too stereo- 
typed for that. Many of them are highly wrought alle- 
gories. Something of the sort is to be found in Egyptian, 
Babylonian, and Persian literature; and there can be no 
doubt that some of the apocalyptists laid the mythologies 
of Babylon, Persia, and Greece under tribute for part 
of their material. 2 Much of it, again, probably came 
from popular traditions which were in circulation among 
the Jews. 3 On the other hand, the Hebrew prophets had 
already shown tendencies which may have determined the 
drift in this direction. All Hebrew writers use meta- 

*See Dan. 7:8; Rev. 12; 13; I En. 83-90; the Test. XII Patr. and 

Ps. Sol. are honorable exceptions. 
3 Cp. J. A. MeCulloch in ERE V 381, and A. C. Zenos, DCG I 80. 
8 Oesterley, Apocrypha, p. 200, Messianic Idea, pp. 41-44; Oesterley 

and Box, Relig. and Worship of the Synagogue (New York, 

1907), pp. 34 f. 



104 The Promise of His Coming 

phorical language that would be impossible to a westerner. 1 
Practically all the prophets record strange visions of a 
more or less symbolical nature. This is particularly true 
of Ezekiel, who is already under the influence of the tre- 
mendously imposing civilization of Babylon. His visions 
have a different character. They are artificially alle- 
gorical and complicated in detail as in none of his prede- 
cessors. Some of them read like the description of a night- 
mare he might have had after spending a day looking 
at the griffins, sphinxes, winged wheels, and other charac- 
teristic features of Assyro-Babylonian art which recent 
excavations have discovered to us. In style as in thought 
Ezekiel stands at the beginning of the new type of proph- 
ecy. Yet for four centuries no writer records such visions 
as his. The language and the ideas of preprophetic escha- 
tology as he had used them in his later years maintain 
themselves unabated. The form of the apocalypse seems 
to develop below the surface, to appear full blown in 
the second century. 

The whole era of Jewish apocalyptic literature from 
Ezekiel to the final dispersion of the Jews from Jerusalem 
in 135 A. D. may be divided into four periods: (1) the 
preliminary period during which it developed its charac- 
teristic forms and ideas, down to the Maccabean revolt; 
(2) the Maccabean period, the time of Jewish independ- 
ence, signalized by the appearance of the first real apoca- 
lypses; (3) the Pharisaic period, from the Roman con- 
quest to the outbreak of the Jewish war, when Jewish 
leadership was anti-apocalyptic ; and (4) the Zelotic peri- 
od, from the Jewish war to Bar-Cochba, when the spirit 
of revolt against Rome was dominant. 2 

The history of the first period is extremely difficult to 

1 See the elaboration of this idea in the article by R. H. Kennet, 

"The Development of the Apocalyptic Style," Interpreter, VIII 4 
(London, July, 1912), 386-401. 

2 See the divisions of Dewick, Primitive Christian Eschatology (New 

York, 1912), p. 57. 



Development of Apocalyptic Literature 105 

reconstruct, since for many generations historical sources 
are lacking. The literature of the time includes Ezekiel, 
Is. 13; 14; 40-66; Jer. 50; 51; Ob. 1-15 at least, Haggai, 
Zech. 1-8, Malachi, Joel, Is. 24-27; 34; 35, and Zech. 9-14. 
These prophecies present quite diverse points of view* As 
we have seen, Ezekiel stands midway between prophecy 
and apocalypticism. Whether Is. 40-66 is the work of one 
author writing sometime between Zerubbabel and Nehe- 
miah 1 or of two or more writers living a hundred years 
apart, 2 the fact remains that from the standpoint of 
apocalyptic thinking the main difference is that Is. 40-55 
is more hopeful, Is. 56-66 less so, and the whole has a 
very different spirit from Ezekiel and the literature that 
follows his example. In spite of untoward outward con- 
ditions the spirit of these chapters is one of high idealism 
and unshaken hopefulness. There is almost no threatening, 
but everywhere the certainty that the great era of glory 
is to be expected in the near future. 

Isaiah 56-66 contains occasional references to the ter- 
rible punishment Tahweh will mete out to the nations 
or the individuals who have opposed him. 3 In Is. 13- 
14:17, in Obadiah, and in Joel (3 :1-17), as in Ezekiel, the 
punishment of Israel's adversaries is described with a 
vindictiveness quite at variance with the spirit of Second 
Isaiah. On the other hand, Haggai, Zech. 1-8, Malachi, 
and Joel, all unite in threatening Israel for her sins. 
Because Yahweh's people have not fulfilled his require- 
ments, the glorious visions of Second Isaiah have not 
become a reality. But the moral standpoint of these 
prophets, like Ezekiel in part, is on the whole distinctly 
priestly and not prophetic, for it is tithes and offerings, 

1 Driver, Introduction 9th ed., p. 230, Kent, Makers and Teachers of 

Judaism (New York, 1911), pp. 61 ff. 
2 Duhm, Das Buch Jesaia ( "Hand- Commen tar zum AT"), 3rd ed., 

pp. xv., 260, 389. 
s 59:15-21; 63:1-6; 66:14-17. 



106 The Promise of His Coming 

not mercy and justice, which they demand of the people. 1 
Thus for a time apocalypticism becomes the handmaid of 
legalism. 

Zechariah 1-8 and Haggai are the only prophets after 
Ezekiel who are exactly datable. At the time of their 
activities (520 B. C.) there seemed to be an immediate 
prospect that Israel might free herself from the Persian 
yoke, and they are convinced that Yahweh meant at this 
time to restore the Davidic line in the person of Zerub- 
babel. But Darius quickly restored order throughout the 
empire and their hopes were dashed to the ground. From 
that time on until the first century B. C. we have no 
allusion to the expectation of a Davidic messiah. 2 

At the close of this preliminary period stand three 
Old Testament passages which show the eschatological type 
of thought highly developed, Is. 34-35, Zech. 9-14, and 
Is. 24-27. Here we find no longer threats against Israel, 
but only promises of a glorious future. The destruction 
of the nations is predicted in the wildest terms of world- 
catastrophe. The reference to Leviathan in Is. 27 takes 
us back to the earliest Babylonian legends, that were 
probably part of common Semitic mythology. As at the 
beginning of creation, so at the beginning of the "new 
age," God is to destroy the powers of evil. But now 
the victory is to end not merely in the defeat, but in 
the complete annihilation of the dragon. 3 In form this 
literature is not the apocalypse; it is not made up of 
visions. In fact, as we have said, from Ezekiel and Zech. 
1-8 to Daniel there is not a piece of literature of the 
vision type. But in spirit these little prophecies prepare 
for the sudden outburst of apocalypses in the time of the 
Maccabean wars. 

1 Zech. 5:1-4 and Mai. 3 combine prophetic and legalistic morality. 

2 It is probable, therefore, that if Is. 9:1-7; 11:1-10; Jer. 23:3-8; 

Mic. 5:2, 4 are not authentic, they belong to the period between 
Ez. (37:21-28) and Haggai. 
3 Cp. Ps. 74:13, 14, probably written about the same time. See Oes- 
terley, Messianic Idea, pp. 53 f. 9 94 ff. 



Development of Apocalyptic Literature 107 

The apocalyptic works of the preliminary period, inso- 
far as their authors are not known, were, no doubt, orig- 
inally anonymous. The real apocalypses are pseudo- 
nymous. To this great central period belong Daniel, I 
Enoch, or Ethiopic Enoch, the earliest section of the Sibyl- 
line oracles (3:97-828), the Testaments of the Twelve 
Patriarchs, and Jubilees. Of these Daniel 7-12 and I 
Enoch are true apocalypses, the latter a sort of apocalyp- 
tic encyclopedia, for it is not the product of one mind, 
but of several, writing at different times during a century 
or more. The characteristic eschatological ideas and lan- 
guage constantly recur, and the message is conveyed usually 
in the form of visions, sometimes of a most bizarre and 
even disgusting sort. The Sibylline Oracles are an at- 
tempt by Hellenistic Jews to use the name of the famous 
heathen priestess to give currency to Jewish views. Though 
this pseudonym demands a different form and treatment, 
the ideas are essentially those of Palestinian apocalyptic 
literature. Jubilees and the Testaments of the Twelve 
Patriarchs are not apocalypses throughout, but place is 
made for certain predictions which are thoroughly apoca- 
lyptic in tone, with this difference that the observance of 
the Law is expected to usher in a change in the condition 
of men so great that a messianic kingdom, temporary 
perhaps, but glorious in righteousness and material pros- 
perity, will come upon the earth. 

The third period of Jewish apocalyptic literature, from 
the Roman conquest of Palestine in 63 B. 0. to the Jewish 
war in 66 A. D., probably saw the completion of Ethiopic 
Enoch in its present form. The one Palestinian apoca- 
lypse belonging wholly to this century and a quarter is the 
Assumption of Moses, 3 but the Psalms of Solomon, which 
are dominated by eschatological ideas, come from the be- 
ginning of this era, and towards its end short apocalypses 
which were later embodied in the Apocalypse of Baruch 

1 G. Holscher, ZNTW XVII (1916) 108-127, 149-158 dates it 131 
A. D. 



108 The Promise of His Coming 

and IV Ezra were written, while to its very close belongs 
the Markan apocalypse. 1 In Egypt the Slavonic (II) 
Enoch and parts of Sibylline Oracles I and II were writ- 
ten. In literature this period is marked by a refinement 
of apocalyptic imagery and a spiritualization of the apoca- 
lyptic ideal. In politics it was distinguished by just the 
opposite tendency, the rise of Zelotism, which dominates 
the nation during the succeeding period. 

After the fall of Jerusalem, during the fourth, or Zelo- 
tic, period, three great apocalypses were compiled: the 
Syriac (II) Baruch and IV Ezra among the Jews, and 
the Eevelation for the Christians. Those portions of these 
two composite Jewish works which were written after the 
fall of the city show a marked tendency toward an anti- 
political, spiritual conception of the end in striking con- 
trast to the prevailing attitude of Jewish society in this 
period. In Egypt the Jewish original of the Greek apoca- 
lypse of Baruch and the fourth and fifth books of the 
Sibylline Oracles were written. 

Later a considerable Christian apocalyptic literature, in 
part depending upon Jewish works, in part original or 
influenced by Greek conceptions of the hereafter, arose. 
Likewise the Jews did not entirely abandon this type of 
literature. The above, however, are the most important 
of the works of this type and the ones that most nearly 
concern us in attempting to trace the origin of Christian 
eschatology and apocalypticism. 

Apocalyptic literature was the natural product of its 
times. Given a nation that was essentially "supernatural- 
istie" in its world view, that was deeply ethical and sensi- 
tively conscientious, and harbored no doubts as to the 
final victory of righteousness, given such a nation suffer- 
ing century after century from its more powerful neigh- 
bors and its own unscrupulous aristocracy, and such a hope 
was an inevitable outcome. How could the Jew know the 

x Mark 13; see below, pp. 155 f., 177 ff. 



Development of Apocalyptic Literature 109 

future, of which he was so certain, except by means of 
visions? How could his vision of that future be given 
form except in the imaginative materials provided by 
mythology and allegory? In such a literature the ideal- 
istic patriot could vent his execration of his foes and warm 
his faith and hope with brilliant visions of a better time 
to come. Repressed by a mechanical view of inspiration 
and canonicity and a pedantic conception of God's manner 
of revealing himself, the prophetic spirit found its ex- 
pression in the varied and exaggerated fashion of these 
works. Thus we may describe the origin of apocalyptic 
literature. Thus arose the apocalyptic attitude toward 
life, the apocalyptic movement, if anything so indefinite 
and unorganized may be called a movement. The mean- 
ing and value of it we shall consider in the next chapter. 



CHAPTEE V 
A COUNSEL OF DESPAIK 

I. The Chief Ideas of Apocalypticism 

IN our sketch of the history of apocalypticism we have 
seen that it was the child of disorder. 1 When the world 
was in commotion, when disasters, political, social, and 
cosmic, seemed to impend, then the imaginations of wide 
circles of people were stirred to the expectation of immi- 
nent change, and the apocalyptist arose to interpret these 
hopes and stimulate them to new vividness and endur- 
ance. 2 He could not sail to the isles of the blest on a 
quiet sea, he must ride upon the storm. He sees hope 
ahead only when evil increases and destruction is upon 
him* He is no believer in the calm processes of social 
evolution and peaceful reform. Only the red hand of 
revolution can heal the woes of the world. It does not 
matter whether the hand is to be God's or man's; his 
reasoning is the same. His is the temper of the social 
revolutionary of today; out of chaos, by some providence, 
a better order will come. His is a counsel of despair, and 
this spirit will be seen in all the chief apocalyptic ideas, 
to which we now turn our attention. 

The despair of apocalypticism appears most distinctly 
in its picture of the evils of the present age and of the 
woes which are expected immediately to precede the end. 
"In the last days" there are to be almost universal sin 
and apostacy with physical portents and calamities of the 

1 See above, pp. 96 f. 

2 See above, pp. 4 f., quotation from Dewey. 

110 



Chief Ideas of Apocalypticism 111 

most terrifying kind. One might quote such predictions 
endlessly from Jewish writers of the centuries just before 
or just after the birth of Jesus. It is to be remembered 
that in every case the descriptions are written as if they 
were ancient prophecies, when in reality they are con- 
temporary accounts. Enoch, or the twelve sons of Jacob, 
or Moses, or Baruch, or Ezra, or Daniel is represented 
as looking down through the centuries and prophesying 
that all these evils will come to pass "in the last days," 
just before the day of judgment. Allusions to recent well 
known historical events are frequent. The reader of that 
age would say at once, "These are the happenings of our 
time ; these are the sins and evils of this generation." And 
he would, therefore, believe what the actual writer be- 
lieved and wished to proclaim, that sin had reached its 
limit, the end was at hand, the last woes were upon the 
world. This is the essence of apocalypticism, that it sees 
the end immediately impending, because the world seems 
incurably evil. 

In the Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs there is 
put into the mouth of Judah a description of conditions 
in the first century B. C. which are thought to presage 
the end, with evident allusion to the Maccabean and He- 
rodian dynasties. It reads, 

"For the kings shall be as sea-monsters ; 
They shall swallow men like fishes; 
The sons and daughters of freemen shall they enslave; 
Houses, lands, flocks, money shall they plunder. 



And there shall be false prophets like tempests, 

And they shall persecute all righteous men. 

And the Lord shall bring upon them divisions one 

against another. 
And there shall be continual wars in Israel; 
And among men of another race shall my kingdom 

be brought to an end, 
Until the salvation of Israel shall come. 



112 The Promise of His Coming 

Now I have much grief, my children, because of 
your lewdness and witchcrafts, and idolatries which ye 
shall practise against the kingdom, following them that 
have familiar spirits, diviners, and demons of error. 
. . . For which things' sake the Lord shall bring upon 
you famine and pestilence, death and the sword, be- 
leaguering by enemies, and revilings of friends, the 
slaughter of children, the rape of wives, the plundering 
of possessions, . . . the laying waste of the land, the 
enslavement of yourselves among the Gentiles. . . . 
And after these things shall a star arise to you from 
Jacob in peace/' 1 

Levi tells the sons gathered around his death-bed, 

"The sons of men . . . sin and provoke the Most 
High. 

Now, therefore, know that the Lord shall execute judg- 
ment upon the sons of men. 

Because when the rocks are being rent, 

And the sun quenched, 

And the waters dried up, 

And the fire cowering, 

And all creation troubled, 

And the invisible spirits melting away, 

And Hades taketh spoils through the visitations of the 
Most High, 

Men will be unbelieving and persist in their iniquity. 

On this account with punishment shall they be 
judged/' 2 

The angel Jeremiah tells Ezra: 

"Concerning the signs, however: 

Behold, the days come when the inhabitants of earth 
shall be seized with great panic, 
And the way of truth shall be hidden, 
and the land be barren of faith. 



*Test. Jud. 21:17-24:1. 
2 Test. Levi 3:10-4:21. 



Chief Ideas of Apocalypticism 113 

And iniquity shall be increased. . . . 

Then shall the sun suddenly shine forth by night 

and the moon by day: 
And blood shall trickle forth from wood, 

and the stone utter its voice : 
The peoples shall be in commotion, 

the outgoings of the stars shall change. 



. . . And the birds shall take to general flight, 
and the sea shall cast forth its fish. 

And the earth o'er wide regions shall open, 
and fire burst forth for a long period : 
The wild beasts shall desert their haunts, and women 

bear monsters. . . . 
And unrighteousness and incontinency shall be mul- 
tiplied upon the earth. . . . 
And it shall be 

In that time men shall hope and not obtain, 
shall labor and not prosper. . . J 91 

Two important notations the attentive reader of the 
above quotations will make: In the first place, it is 
quite apparent that the apocalyptic writer passes very 
easily from actual description of the present to imagi- 
native and sometimes grotesque pictures of what may be 
expected in the immediate future. In the second place, 
one familiar with the New Testament will remark the 
striking likeness between much of this language and that 
of such passages as Mark 13 and Rev. 16, and will be 
prepared for the obvious conclusion that many early 
Christians adopted the pessimism of the apocalyptic world 
view and even the phrases in which it was expressed. 

The great day of Yahweh, or day of Judgment, as it 
came to be called in this period, was to make an end 
of this age and introduce the coming one. To the Jews 

1 IV Ezra 5:1-2, 4-8, 11-12; cp. I En. 91:5-7: 100:1-3; Jub. 23:9-25: 
II Bar. 24:1-29:1; 32:4-6, etc. 



114: The Promise of Bis Coming 

who lived between 200 B. C. and 100 A. D., the situa- 
tion was in all essential particulars the same as it had 
been for Nahum, Zephaniah, and Jeremiah. Judgment 
was still in the future or was just culminating. Sin was 
still unpunished; the new age of righteousness and hap- 
piness was still to appear. There was, however, this im- 
portant difference, that they had ancient and apparently 
very definite prophecies whose predictions were unful- 
filled. This, with the influx of Babylonian and Persian 
mythology, caused that distinct retrogression we have 
noted to those popular notions which the prophets had 
attempted to reinterpret or supplant. 1 This is especially 
true with regard to the purpose of the judgment that is 
to come and its relation to nature and history. 

The very change of name from day of Yahweh to day 
of Judgment indicates a new conception of this "great 
day." For the apocalyptist it was not so much a time 
of God's self-manifestation as a time of the revelation 
and punishment of wickedness. The old popular idea of 
a vindication of Israel and a punishment or destruction 
of all her foes comes again to the front in Ezekiel and 
all his spiritual successors. 2 To be sure, the individual- 
ism of Ezekiel is not forgotten. The wicked Jew is to 
suffer along with the Gentiles. The apocalyptist belongs 
to a special group of "the righteous." But along with 
sectarian particularism went a national particularism 
which tended to bring all Jews within the sphere of God's 
mercy and to exclude all Gentiles. IV Ezra gays, 

"Thou hast said that for our sakes Thou hast created 
this world. But as for the other nations, which are de- 
scended from Adam, Thou hast said that they are 
nothing, and that they are like unto spittle; and Thou 
hast likened the abundance of them to a drop on a 
(bucket. ... If the world has indeed been created for 



1 See above, pp. 66 f., 80 f., 99 ff. 

2 Charles, Eschatology, pp. 101, 105 f., 115 ff. 



Chief Ideas of Apocalypticism 115 

our sakes, why do we not enter into possession of our 
world ?" 1 

This was the orthodox view of Pharisaism. But many 
of the apocalyptists, who were far from orthodox, were 
true universalists, following the lofty ideals of Jeremiah 
and of Is. 19:24 f. 2 Judgment was to come upon all 
the world, and all the world was to become righteous as 
a result of its purifying fires. "The Gentiles shall be mul- 
tiplied in knowledge upon the earth, and enlightened 
through the grace of the Lord/' says the Testament of 
Levi. 3 In other passages a sort of compromise is at- 
tempted such as Second Isaiah had suggested. Israel, the 
servant of Tahweh, is to be the light of the Gentiles. 

"From your root shall arise a stem; 
And from it shall grow a rod of righteousness to the 

Gentiles, 
To judge and to save all that call upon the Lord." 4 

There is a certain very unlovely vindictiveness about 
the predictions of judgment upon the wicked. According 
to the Similitudes of Enoch (I En. 37-71), the rulers ol 
the earth shall petition the Son of man for mercy, but God 
will drive them away. 

"And he will deliver them to the angels for punish- 
ment, 

To execute vengeance on them because they have op- 
pressed His children and His elect; 

And they shall be a spectacle for the righteous and 
for His elect: 

They shall rejoice over them, 

Because the wrath of the Lord of Spirits resteth upon 
them, 

And His sword is drunk with their blood." 5 



1 6:55-57, 59; cp. 7:11; Ass. Mos. 1:12; II Bar. 14:19. 

2 Oesterlev, Apocrypha, pp. 103 f. ; Charles, Escliatology, pp. 101 f., 

107 ff. 
a 18:9. 

*Test. Jud. 24:5 f., first centurv B. C. according to Charles. 
6 1 En. 62:11 f. Cp. chap. 63 and Ass. Mos. 10^:10. 



116 The Promise of His Coming 

On the other hand, the apocalyptists are forerunners of 
Jesus and Paul in their proclamation of salvation to all 
who repent. They stand as the connecting link between 
the lofty spiritual ideals of ancient Hebrew prophetisin 
and Christian evangelism. 

We have seen that according to the ancient popular 
theology Yahweh was expected to manifest himself on his 
great day by various terrifying and destructive natural 
phenomena, or even by cosmic convulsions more disastrous 
than the Flood of ancient legend. The prophets in part 
adopted the popular language and ideas, in part reinter- 
preted them, or combined with them the idea of a divine 
interposition in history. Thus they at least suggested 
less a mechanical intervention from without than a di- 
vine, providential working through society. The Jewish 
apocalyptists for the most part know only a thoroughly 
mechanical, supernaturalistic interposition from without. 
The two principal exceptions are the legalistic, half -apoca- 
lyptic book of Jubilees, which portrays the coming of the 
new age by a gradual development as the result of the 
study of the Law, 1 and the Maccabean, half -apocalyptic 
Testament of Levi, where the Levitic messiah inaugu- 
rates a reign of righteousness. 2 But for most of the 
apocalyptists of the second and first centuries B. C, the 
day of Judgment means a supernatural interference with 
the course of nature and history, by which the kings and 
mighty are put down, and the righteous poor exalted. 

It means also a cosmic catastrophe that involves the 
whole universe. In the Assumption of Moses we read : 

"For the Heavenly One will arise from His royal throne, 
And He will go forth from His holy habitation 
With indignation and wrath on account of His sons. 
And the earth shall tremble; to its confines shall it be 
shaken : 

1 23:26-29. 

2 18:1-14. 



Chief Ideas of Apocalypticism 117 

And the high mountains shall be made low 

And the hills shall be shaken and fall. 

And the horns of the sun shall be broken and he 

shall be turned into darkness; 
And the moon shall not give her light, and be turned 

wholly into blood. 
And the circle of the stars shall be disturbed. 
And the sea shall retire into the abyss, 
And the fountains of waters shall fail, 
And the rivers shall dry up. 

For the Most High will arise, the Eternal God alone. 
And He will appear to punish the Gentiles, 
And He will destroy all their idols." 1 

As with the prophets, so with the apocalyptists, it is 
difficult to say how far such language is to be taken lit- 
erally. Gradually, however, the conviction grew upon 
Jewish thinkers that this earth is wholly evil and must 
be destroyed before God can reign in righteousness. Such 
was probably the view of the writer just quoted. Such 
was certainly the opinion of the author of the fourth book 
of the Sibylline Oracles, who says, 

"Fire shall come upon the whole world, and a mighty 

sign, 
With sword and trumpet at the rising of the sun. 
The whole world shall hear a rumbling and a mighty 

roar. 
And He shall burn the whole earth, and consume the 

whole race of men, 
And all the cities, and rivers, and the sea. 
He shall burn everything out, and there shall be a 

sooty dust." 2 

The passivistic, supernaturalistic type of belief is pre- 
sented most clearly and beautifully in the so-called Salath- 
iel-apocalypse of IV Ezra. Its thought can best be ap- 
preciated as embodying, on the one hand, the lessons 
learned in the Jewish war and the destruction of the city, 

1 10:3-7; cp. I En. 1:3-7. 

2 4:173-178, dated about 80 A. D., Lanchester. 



118 The Promise of His Comiiyg 

and, on the other hand, a polemic against messianism, par- 
ticularly, perhaps, that of the Christians. 1 The seer re- 
lates, 

"Then said 1 : Lord,, I beseech thee, if I have found 
favor in Thy sight, show Thy servant by whom Thou wilt 
visit Thy creation. 

And he said unto me: In the beginning of the ter- 
restrial world 

before ever the Heavenward portals were standing, 
or ever the wind-blasts blew; 
before the rumblings of thunderings did sound, 
or ever the lightning-flashes did shine ; 

When the foundations of paradise were not yet laid, 
nor the beauty of its flowers yet seen ; 



Before ever the heights of the air were uplifted, 
ere the spaces of the firmament were named, 
ere the foot-stool of Sion was appointed, 

Even then had I these things in mind; and through me 
alone and none other were they created; as also the End 
shall come through me alone and none other." 2 

Less polemical but equally spiritual and imaginative is 
the description of the day of Judgment : 

"For thus shall the Day of Judgment be : 

A day whereon is neither sun, nor moon, nor stars; 

neither clouds, nor thunder, nor lightning; 

neither wind, nor rain-storm, nor cloud-rack; 

neither darkness, nor evening, nor morning; 

neither summer, nor autumn, nor winter; 

neither heat, nor frost, nor cold; 

neither hail, nor rain, nor dew ; 

neither noon, nor night, nor dawn ; 

neither shining, nor brightness, nor light, 

save only the splendor of the brightness of the Most 

1 Charles, Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha, II 574. 
a 5:56; 6:1-4, 6. 



Chief Ideas of Apocalypticism 119 

High, whereby all shall be destined to see what has 
been determined for them." 1 

One characteristic development of the idea of judgment 
makes it include the overthrow of all the spiritual hosts 
of wickedness in the heavenly places. Owing to the in- 
fluence of Babylonia and Persia, there began in the time 
of the Exile a startling recrudescence of primitive animism 
in the development of angelology and demonology. 2 Juda- 
ism almost accepted the dualism of Zoroastrianism. Ac- 
cordingly, a cardinal feature of apocalypticism was the 
belief — already present in germ in the ancient mythology 
— that, in the Lord's great day of Judgment, he would 
overthrow all the fallen angels and the hostile evil spirits 
who had opposed his will. The legend of war in heaven 
between the devil with his angels and the hosts of God 
is not infrequently referred to in the apocalypses. 3 It is 
foreshadowed or implied in the references in Daniel to 
the struggles of Gabriel and Michael with the (demonic) 
princes of Persia and Greece. 4 It developed into the 
complicated and variously interpreted conception of Anti- 
christ, the demonic counterpart of the messiah and leader 
of the hosts of wickedness in the heavenly regions, who 
was to become incarnate just before the end. 5 

The judgment and punishment of hostile heavenly hosts 
is the first act of the apocalyptic drama of the last day. 

1 7:39-42. 

2 See above, pp. 100 f. 

8 Sib. Or. 3:796-807; II Mac. 5:2-4; Josephus, War vi 5, 3. Rev. 12: 
7 introduced it to Christian thought. Cp. Test. Dan 6:1-5; II 
Bar. 27:9; Charles, Studies in the Apocalypse (Edinburgh, 
1913), p. 129. 

4 Dan. 10:13, 20, 21; 12:1; cp. Dt. 32:8 in the LXX; see Driver, 
"Int. Crit. Com.," Deuteronomy, ad loc, and H. P. Smith, Re- 
ligion of Israel, p. 305. 

5 See Bousset, The Antichrist Legend (London, 1896), especially 
chap, x, where it is shown that the legend arose out of the old 
myth of the primeval dragon, conquered, but not destroyed 
by God, who "in the last days" would rise again in revolt before 
beiag finally annihilated. 



fd£ 



120 The Promise of His Coming 

The myths that are at the bottom of this belief are fre- 
quently referred to in the latter part of the Old Testa- 
ment. 1 Later Jewish and Christian apocalypses develop 
the idea. In I En. 90, after the Lord has taken his seat 
upon the throne of judgment, he first of all summons 
before him the fallen and faithless angels, "and they 
were judged and found guilty, and went to the place of 
condemnation, and they were cast into an abyss, full of 
fire and flaming, and full of pillars of fire." 2 "Then 
Satan shall be no more, and sorrow shall depart with 
him/' says the Assumption of Moses. 3 The Book of 
Eevelation made this idea also at home in Christian doc- 
trine. 

The second act in the drama of judgment was the over- 
throw and punishment of "the kings and the mighty and 
the exalted, and those who hold the earth," to quote the 
Similitudes of Enoch. 4 These are probably the Sadducees 
and the Jewish native rulers, who in a later section of 
the book, are designated as "blinded sheep," 5 for the 
later Maccabeans and all the Sadducees had been oppo- 
nents and persecutors of the pious observers of the Law- 
Their punishment is thus described: 

"And this Son of Man whom thou hast seen, 
Shall put down the kings and the mighty from their 

seats, 
And shall loosen the reins of the strong, 
And break the teeth of sinners. 



Then shall pain come on them as on a woman in travail, 

And one portion of them shall look on the other, 
And they shall be terrified, 



x Is. 24:21-23; 27:1; 34:4 f.; Job 3:8; 41:1; Ps. 74:13 f.; Is. 51:1 

etc., cp. above, pp. 48 ff. 
2 V. 24; cp. 100:4; 10:4-16. 
•10:1. 

4 I En. 62:3: cp. 38:4, 5; 46:4-8; 48:8-10; 53:1-7; 62:1-12; 63. 
5 90:26. 



Chief Ideas of Apocalypticism 121 

And they shall be downcast of countenance, 
And pain shall seize them, 
When they see that Son of Man 
Sitting on the throne of his glory." 1 

Although they will humbly repent and Supplicate for 
mercy at his hands/' 

"Their faces shall be filled with darkness 
And shame before that Son of Man, 
And they shall be driven from his presence, 
And the sword shall abide before his face in their 
midst." 2 

Class consciousness, bom of ethical and religious as well 
as social differences, speaks here, as it does in many 
passages in the gospels. 3 Jesus and his followers in- 
herited this attitude, but they include, not merely the 
Sadducees, but the Pharisees and non-Jewish rulers among 
the mighty who are to be overthrown. 

The day of Judgment will be a time of revelation of 
secret sins and of separation between the righteous and thp 
wicked. 4 The Son of Man "revealeth all the treasures of 
that which is hidden." 5 

"For he is mighty in all the secrets of righteousness, 
And unrighteousness shall disappear as a shadow, 
And have no continuance; 



And he shall judge the secret things, 

And none shall be able to utter a lying word before 

him." 6 
"He shall be a staff to the righteous whereon to stay 

themselves and not fall; 
And he shall be the light of the Gentiles, 
And the hope of those who are troubled of heart." 7 



*I En. 46:4; 62:4 f. 

2 I En. 62:6-12; 63:10 f. 

8 Lk. 1:51 ff.; 6:20-26; cp. above, pp. 88 ff. 

*1 En. 51:2. 

5 I En. 46:3. 

6 I En. 49:2, 4. 
7 1 En. 48:4. 



122 The Promise of His Coming 

"And the earth shall be wholly rent in sunder, 
And all that is upon the earth shall perish, 
And there shall be a judgment upon all men. 
But with the righteous He will make peace, 
And will protect the elect, 
And mercy shall be upon them. 
And they shall all belong to God, 
And they shall be prospered, 
And they shall all be blessed. 

And behold! He cometh with ten thousands of His 

holy ones, 
To execute judgment upon all, 
And to destroy all the ungodly; 
And to convict all flesh 
Of all the works of their ungodliness which they have 

ungodly committed, 
And of all the hard things which ungodly sinners have 

spoken against Him." 1 

Thus the day of Judgment becomes essentially a time 
of triumph for the pious and a vindication of his faith 
and practice. If one looks away from the occasional nar- 
row nationalism and religious snobbery of these writers, 
one cannot but be impressed with their tremendous moral 
earnestness. In spite of all its defects apocalypticism 
rendered a great service in the emphasis it laid on right- 
eous living. 

The relation of the divine kingdom to the day of judg- 
ment was variously conceived. The view that the new 
age of righteousness and joy would develop naturally out 
of the old tended of necessity to modify or obscure the 
thought of the great day of judgment. 2 The prevailing 
view of the second century before Christ was that the 
judgment preceded the Golden Age, which was to endure 
eternally upon the earth. 4 But, with the disappointment 

1 I En. 1:7-9; cp. Jude 14 f., a direct quotation. 

3 So in Jubilees and the Test, of Levi; see above, pp. 107, 115 f. 

8 Charles, Esehatology, p. 199. 



Chief Ideas of Apocalypticism 123 

of their hopes, which the pious suffered during that cen- 
tury, and the spread of the non-Jewish idea that matter 
was essentially evil, the conviction grew that no rule of 
righteousness could be permanent upon this earth, and so 
the final judgment was adjourned to the close of a tem- 
porary messianic kingdom. 1 There might be preliminary 
judgments, as in the Flood, or by the sword of the Macca- 
bees, 2 and there must be one at the beginning of the new 
age, but accounts would not be finally closed until the 
present heaven and earth should pass away. 3 The keen- 
ness of the feeling that matter was evil determined whether 
the apocalyptist believed that the judgment preceding the 
messianic kingdom involved a complete transformation of 
the earth. In some books the hope even of a temporary 
messianic kingdom is abandoned. 4 In others, again, its 
exact duration is predicted; according to one part of IV 
Ezra, 400 years, according to II Enoch, 1,000 years. 5 

We find, then, three chief theories as to the character 
of the new age : 

(1) It is to be of eternal duration on this present earth 
(I En. 1-36, II Mac.) ; 

(2) It is to be of temporary duration on the earth (Ps. 
Sol., Sib. Or., Jub., Ass. Mos., II En., II Bar., IV Ez.) ; 

(3) It is to be of eternal duration in a new heaven and 
a new earth (I En. 37-70; cp. Is. 65:17; 66:22; Zech. 
14 :6 f. ; Is. 60 :19 f.). The new heaven and earth were to 
be "eternal blessing and light." 6 

1 Ibid., pp. 200-203, 233 f . 

2 Dan. 2:44; I En. 91:12; 95:7; 98:12. 
8 Charles, op. cit., p. 233 f . 

*II Bar, 49-52; IV Ezra, IV Mac; see Charles, op. cit., p. 243. 

6 II En. 32:2-33:2; IV Ez. 7:28 f. See Charles, Eschatology, p. 

243, and Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha, II 451, note. 
6 1 En. 45:4 f. 



124 The Promise of His Coming 

"And the righteous and elect shall be saved in that day, 



And the Lord of Spirits will abide over them, 
And with that Spn of Man shall they eat 
And lie down and rise up for ever and ever." 1 

This was, no doubt, all spiritually conceived. On the 
other hand, those pictures of Edenic ease and plenty which 
the prophets had painted 2 were understood literally and 
repeated with additional details by the apocalyptic writers. 
In the earlier section of I Enoch we read, 

"And then shall the righteous escape, 
And shall live till they beget thousands of children. 



And then shall the whole earth be tilled in righteous- 
ness, and shall be planted with trees and be full of bless- 
ing. And all desirable trees shall be planted on it, and 
they shall plant vines on it: and the vine which they 
plant thereon shall yield wine in abundance, and as for 
all the seed which is sown thereon, each measure (of it) 
shall bear a thousand, and each measure of olives shall 
yield ten presses of oil." 3 

We may well suppose that this conception of the new 
age was preferred by the rank and file of the nation. 

Four different views regarding the ' messiah appear in 
Jewish literature: 

(1) In a large number of apocalyptic works, as in sev- 
eral Old Testament books, he does not appear at all, 4 or 
else plays a very unimportant role. 5 

*I En. 62:13, f. 

2 Am. 9:13 f.; Hos. 2:22 f . ; Jer. 31:5; Ez. 28:26; 34:26 f.; Is. 41:18 

ff.; 51:3; 25:6; 55:13; Joel 3:18; etc., cp. above, pp. 55 ff. 
3 10:17 ff.; see Gressmann, Ursprung, pp. 207-221; Volz, Jiidische 

Eschatalogie, pp. 350 f . ; see Charles, Apoc. and Pseudep. II, note 

to I En. 25:4 and to II Bar. 29:5. 
4 Nah„ Hab., Zeph., I En. 1-36; 9-104; I and II Mac, Judith, Ass. 

Mos., Wis., II En., IV Mac. See Charles, Eschatology, Index, 

s. v. "Messiah'". 
5 Ez. 37:24 f.; 45.7 ff., 17; 46:16 ff., etc.; I En. 90:37; Sib. Or. 

3:652-6. 



Chief Ideas of Apocalypticism 125 

(2) In the original Testaments of the Twelve Patri- 
archs, written during the height of the Maccabean suc- 
cesses and before the breach of the dynasty with the Phari- 
sees, the messiah is to come from the tribe of Levi, since 
the Maccabeans belonged to that priestly tribe. 1 

(3) With the disappointment of this hope, later inter- 
polations were made in the Testaments of the Twelve 
Patriarchs claiming the messiah again for Judah, 2 a view 
that became dominant from the first century on. The 
popular view, no doubt, made this Davidic messiah a thor- 
oughly temporal conqueror. But a spiritually militant 
anointed one of the lineage of David is described in the 
Psalms of Solomon: 

"Behold, Lord, and raise up unto them their king, 

the son of David, 
At the time in which Thou seest, God, that he may 
reign over Israel Thy servant. 



Wisely, righteously, he shall thrust out sinners from 

the inheritance, 
He shall destroy the pride of the sinner as a potter's 

vessel. 
With a rod of iron he shall break in pieces all their 

substance, 
He shall destroy the godless nations with the word of 

his mouth. 



And he shall have the heathen nations to serve him 

under his yoke; 
And he shall glorify the Lord in a place to be seen 

of all the earth; 
And he shall purge Jerusalem, making it holy as of 

old; 
So that nations shall come from the ends of the earth 

to see 'his glory, 

2 Test. Reub. 6:7-12; Test. Levi. 8:14; 18; Test. Jud. 24:1-3; etc.; 

see Charles, Test, of the Twelve Patr. (London, 1908), p. xcvii. 
2 Test. Jud. 24:5 f. 



126 The Promise of His Coming 

Bringing as gifts her sons who had fainted, 

And to see the glory of the Lord, wherewith God hath 

glorified her. 
And he shall be a righteous king, taught of God, over 

theml, 
And there shall be no unrighteousness in his days in 

their midst, 
For all shall be holy and their king the anointed of 

the Lord. 1 
For he shall not put his trust in horse and rider and 

bow, 
Nor shall he multiply for himself gold and silver 

for war, 
Nor shall he gather confidence from a multitude for 

the day of battle. 
The Lord Himself is his king, the hope of him that 

is mighty thjough his hope in God." 2 

This, and more like it, justify the statement of Ryle and 
James : 

"In this representation of the human Messiah, per- 
fect in holiness and taught of God, free from sin and 
wielding only the weapons of spiritual power, we find 
ourselves brought more nearly than in any other extant 
pre-Christian writing to the idealization of 'the Christ' 
who was born into the world not half a century later 
than the time at which these Psalms were written." 3 

(4) In place of this greater Son of David, human, but 
divinely ideal and sinless, the Similitudes of Enoch put a 
pre-existent, heavenly Son of Man. The title is borrowed 
directly from Daniel, but what is there only a personifica- 
tion or an angelic representative of the people of Israel 4 
is here a distinct personality. He is thus described : 

x In the Greek: Christ, the Lord. 

8 17:23, 26, 27, 32-38. 

9 Psalms of the Pharisees (Cambridge, 1891), p. lvii. 

*Dan. 7:9-27; cp. v. 14 with v. 27. 



Chief Ideas of Apocalypticism 127 

"And there I saw One who had a head of days, 
And His head was white like wool, 
And with Him was another being whose countenance 

had the appearance of a man, 
And his face was full of graciousness, like one of 

the holy angels. 
And I asked the angel who went with me and showed 
me all the hidden things, concerning that Son of Man, 
who he was, and whence he was, and why he went with 
the Head of Days. And he answered and said unto me: 
This is the Son of Man who hath righteousness, 
With whom dwelleth righteousness, 
And who revealeth all the treasures of that which is 

hidden, 
Because the Lord of Spirits hath chosen him, 
And whose lot hath pre-eminence before the Lord of 
Spirits in uprighteousness forever." 1 

"Yea, before the sun and the signs were created, 
Before the stars of the Heaven were made, 
His name was named before the Lord of Spirits. 
He shall be a staff to the righteous whereon to stay 

themselves and not fall, 
And he shall be the light of the Gentiles, 
And the hope of those who are troubled of heart. 
All who dwell on earth shall fall down and worship 

before him, 
And will praise and bless and celebrate with song 

the Lord of Spirits. 
And for this reason hath he been chosen and hidden 

before Him, 
Before the creation of the world and for evermore." 2 
"And he sat on the throne of his glory, 
And the sum of judgment was given unto the Son 

of Man, 
And he caused sinners to pass away and be destroyed 

from off the face of the earth, 
And those who have led the world astray." 8 

^En. 46:1-3. 
2 1 En. 48:3-0. 
3 1 En. 69:27. 



128 The Promise of His Coming 

This unique conception of the messiah as the Son of 
Man, interpreting the Danielic personification or angelic 
representative of Israel as a real personality, second only 
to God in glory and power, is one of the most interesting 
developments in all pre-Christian apocalyptic literature, 
because of the use Jesus made of it and of its contribution 
of the idea of pre-existence to the Christian conception 
of the person of Christ. Synchronous with the early 
Christian preaching are the portrayals in II Bar. 53-74 
and IV Ez. 13 : 1-53 of a less distinctly personal messiah 
who is likewise a superhuman, heavenly being appearing 
on the clouds. 

Jewish apocalypticism developed one of the most im- 
portant of religious doctrines, the belief in the resurrection 
of the individual. While we have undertaken to study 
the development of apocalyptic thinking from the stand- 
point of society rather than the individual, we cannot omit 
this subject, just because it marks so distinct a change 
from the purely social morality of pre-exilic times, and 
also because it offered a synthesis of individual and social 
eschatology. 

From our documents it appears that, before the Exile 
and for many centuries after it, the Israelite, like the 
Babylonian and the Greek, thought of the condition of the 
dead as at best not a real spiritual life but only a shadowy 
existence without warmth or vitality. Indeed it would 
seem to have been the common belief that Sheol, the abode 
of the dead, swallowed up the soul completely. It was 
the land of forgetfulness (Ps. 88:12), of silence (Ps. 
94 : 17), of destruction (Job 26 : 6 ; 28 : 22). The Hebrew 
besought God to keep him alive that he might worship : 

"Keturn, Yahweh, deliver my soul; 
Save me for thy loving kindness 5 sake. 
For in death there is no remembrance of thee : 
In Sheol who shall give thee thanks ?" x 

ip s . 6:4, 5; cp. 30:9; 88:10 ff.; 115:17; Is. 38:18. 



Chief Ideas of Apocalypticism 129 

The practical but skeptical "Preacher" advised : 

"Enjoy life with the wife whom thou lovest. . . . 
Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy 
might; for there is no work, nor device, nor knowledge, 
nor wisdom, in Sheol, whither thou goest." 1 

With the rise of the conception of individual morality, 
the idea that this world was the end of life came to be 
challenged. God was just, but the righteous did not al- 
ways get their deserts in this life. Just as the misfor- 
tunes of the nation made necessary a revision of the early 
conception of Yahweh's relation to the nation, so the suf- 
ferings of the righteous made necessary a revision of the 
popular conception of the fate of the individual, if men 
were to believe in the righteousness of God. Job is one 
of the documentary remains of the struggle between con- 
flicting views. It appears in Ecclesiastes. 2 The only 
clear enunciation of a belief in immortality in the Old 
Testament outside of Job is found in Ps. 49 and 73. 
Eventually the future of the nation and the individual 
threatened to become separate, if not antagonistic ideas, 
as they have with us. 

But alongside the doctrine of individual moral responsi- 
bility and the consequent faith that a righteous God must 
in some way reward the righteous and punish the wicked 
in a future existence, Jewish patriotism maintained unim- 
paired the idea of a future period of superlative power 
and prosperity for God's people, Israel. The synthesis 
of these two ideas was found in the doctrine of the bodily 
resurrection, which made it possible for the righteous 
Israelite to come back to earth to enjoy the delights of 
the messianic kingdom, while the wicked languished in 
Sheol, now become a place of punishment and frequently 
called Gehenna. It was the dominance in Judaism of the 

a Eccl. 9:9 f. 
a 2:14; 7:15; 9:2. 



130 The Promise of His Coming 

materialistic conception of the reign of God on earth which 
made the adoption of the belief in the bodily resurrection 
natural, and encumbered Christianity with this unreason- 
able conception of the future life. Later, probably be- 
fore the time of Jesus, the two ideas began to drop apart 
again. The hope of a future restoration of the nation 
could not be abandoned; but the idea of resurrection 
tended to pass into that of a personal spiritual immortality 
in a heavenly existence. 



II. The Basic Principles of Apocalypticism: 
Its Philosophy of History 

When we turn from the study of the chief ideas of 
apocalypticism to consider the principles upon which they 
are based, we discover that we have before us a real achieve- 
ment, possibly the earliest philosophy of history. It goes 
out beyond the borders of the nation and takes in the whole 
world in a more or less orderly system. In outline it 
runs thus: Under the domination of the powers of evil, 
the world will go on growing worse and worse until God 
can endure it no longer ; then he will intervene in the great 
day of Yahweh, or day of judgment, when all the wicked 
will be overthrown and the powers of evil destroyed or 
bound. Thus the way is cleared for the new age of in- 
describable peace and prosperity which the righteous will 
enjoy. The basic principles of the philosophy of history 
that lies back of this expectation are pessimism, determin- 
ism, externalism, and literalism, strangely mingled with 
universalism and moral idealism. 

Apocalypticism is absolutely pessimistic as to the pres- 
ent earthly regime. As we have said, running through 
all this literature is a deep note of despair ; the history of 
Judaism may be summed up in the three words, suffering, 



Basic Principles of Apocalypticism 131 

hope, despair. The apocalypses always come from a time 
when the faithful are suffering to the uttermost. Their 
purpose is to console the pious with the hope of the glori- 
ous future which is soon to break upon them, when they 
have reached the last limit of endurance. Apocalypticism 
is, therefore, a counsel of despair. It is a naive, popular 
philosophy, which says that the darkest hour is just be- 
fore dawn, the philosophy of disappointed and defeated 
old age, which insists that the world is hopelessly bad 
and growing worse. It is a heathen philosophy, which 
insists that the only way to redeem the world is to de- 
stroy it. 

The Hindu conception of Kali Tuga is an almost exact 
duplicate of it. A few years ago a Hindu periodical pub- 
lished an article by a student who, with the cocksure con- 
sistency of youth, argued that, since the gods would not 
destroy the earth and start the cycle again with the Golden 
Age until this age had reached the utmost limits of wick- 
edness, it must be right in this age to do wrong. The 
most terrible monster of wickedness was hastening the 
coming of the Golden Age, the righteous man was delaying 
it. An entirely logical deduction from the given prem- 
ises! 

The pessimism of Jewish apocalyptists was taken from 
the prophets, but was tenfold augmented by the centuries 
of disappointed hopes through which the nation had gone. 
Its foundation is to be sought in the stern morality of both 
prophet and apocalyptist, and it speaks well for their moral 
earnestness. Its basic error is its skepticism; it fails to 
take account of God's power to regenerate man and so- 
ciety. 

The second basic principle of apocalypticism is its de- 
terminism. The Jew believed that the whole history of 
the world, past and future, had been definitely ordered 
by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God, 
Says IV Ezra, a younger contemporary of Paul, 



132 The Promise of His Coming 

"The Most High has made not one Age but two. . . . 
The present age has an end (or, is not the end: L) ; the 
glory of God abides not therein continuously. . . . But 
the Day of Judgment shall be the end of this age and the 
beginning of the eternal age that is to come ; wherein 

corruption is passed away, 

weakness is abolished, 

infidelity is cut off; 
while righteousness is grown 

and faithfulness is sprung up." 1 

All existence has been divided into the two ages, this 
age and the future age. The course of this age, again, has 
been prearranged according to a set scheme in which 
sacred numbers play a large part. Thus arose the calcula- 
tions of the times and seasons which have been the bane 
of Premillennialism down to the present. Since God has 
prearranged all, there must necessarily be an orderly, 
symmetrical scheme of the ages, so the believer argued. 
With a few sacred numbers as a beginning, it was easy to 
reckon back into the past and determine just how long it 
would be until the great turning point in history might be 
expected. 

The seventy years Jeremiah had predicted for the 
Captivity became the starting point for many curious 
computations. 2 The idea of four world empires, or eras, 
is common to Jewish, Persian, and Greek tradition. 3 
According to II En. 33:1 f. the world is to last seven 
thousand years, after which eternity is to begin. This 
computation is definitely based on the seven days of cre- 
ation, probably combined with the idea that a day is with 
the Lord as a thousand years. 4 The number "twelve" 



n-.dO, 112-114. 

2 Dan. 9:24-27; I En. 89:59 ff.; 10:12; cp. Jer. 25:11; 29:10. 

3 Dan. 2:22; 7:3, 17; Rev. 6:1-8; I En. 89:59 ff.; IV Ez. 12; II 

Bar. 39. 
*II Pt. 3:8; Ps. 90:4; Barn. 15. 



Basic Principles of Apocalypticism 133 

figures in some of the apocalypses, probably borrowed from 
astrology. 1 

Such a conception of history is thoroughly mechanical 
and deterministic, and absolutely opposed to that sense 
of organic, genetic relationships in history and society 
which was beginning to dawn upon the prophets, and which 
is a part of the modern man's view of the world. It does 
credit to the Jew's confidence in God's governance of the 
universe, but it is in reality an unconscious prostitution of 
the idea of divine sovereignty and a fatalistic parody of 
faith in divine providence. 

The apocalyptic point of view was mechanically ex- 
ternal and unspiritual. It held that the only salvation 
for the world lay in interference from without. There 
are still those who insist on the sovereign will of God. 
He is thought to rule as a despot. Democracy has no place 
in his plan of the universe. This is exactly the view of 
apocalypticism. From the apocalyptic point of view there 
are no good forces in human nature and society which 
the divine Spirit can fructify and cause to grow. Good- 
ness must be imposed in autocratic fashion from above. 
God is outside the world of nature and man, which is 
ruled by the Devil. Some day, when God's long-suffering 
has reached its limit, no matter what man desires, God 
will come down and establish his rule on earth. Democ- 
racy and apocalypticism, evolution and apocalypticism are 
contradictory terms. 

The combination of determinism and externalism with 
an idea of revelation according to which God has already 
fully made known his will to the lawgivers and prophets 
of the past rendered a literalistic interpretation of the 

^V Ez. 4:36 fT.; 14:11; I En. 89:72. The fact that these numbers 
are found in the eschatology or mythology of Persia and Greece 
is an indication of the origin of this sort of speculation; the 
whole idea of predetermined periods of history is probably of 
astrological and, therefore, Babylonian origin. See Charles, 
Eschatology, pp. 168-175; Gressmann, TJrsprung, pp. 160-168; 
Oesterley, Apocrypha, pp. 98 f. 



134 The Promise of His Coming 

sacred writings inevitable. All that has been foretold 
must take place word for word and letter for letter. Pro- 
phecies that seem not to have been fulfilled must be 
adjourned to the future. So, in a sense, Isaiah may have 
done with the oracle against Moab. 1 So Ezekiel did with 
the prophecy of a foe from the north which he recon- 
structed into the coming of Gog from the land of Magog ; 
out of which in turn the New Testament apocalyptist 
manufactured his now famous Armageddon. 2 Thus Dan- 
iel and I Enoch try to reinterpret the seventy years of 
Jeremiah. Above all, the expectation of a literal fulfill- 
ment of the ancient prophecies of the coming of the mes- 
sianic kingdom led to that long and heart-rending series 
of disappointments which we sketched in Jewish history. 3 
It caused to blossom up in each period of supreme suffer- 
ing the inextinguishable hope of a better time coming. 
Thus it assisted in keeping alive some of the highest 
ideals man has ever conceived. But, just because of its 
literalism, it combined with so much that was chauvinistic 
and impossible as to defeat itself. Worst of all, this 
feature, common to apocalypticism of both ancient and 
modern times, makes inspiration a mechanical dictation 
and the Bible a heathen oracle which must be twisted by 
force into some sort of accord with subsequent events. It 
is essentially superstitious and unspiritual and, there- 
fore, unchristian. 

Over against this unfavorable characterization of apoca- 
lypticism we must put certain features which in part 
redeem it and give it permanent value. This determinism 
and literalism are the product of an unswerving allegiance 
to God in the face of the most stupendous trial of faith. 
These men believed with all their hearts that "the fear of 
the Lord is the beginning of wisdom." Just because they 

1 Is. 15; 16. Some so understand Is. 2:2-4; and Mic. 4:1-3. 

2 See above, p. 65 ft., and Gressmann, Ursprung, pp. 174-192; Charles, 

Eschatology, p. 169. 

3 See above, pp. 89-96. 



Basic Principles of Apocalypticism 135 

believed in the righteousness of God, they believed in the 
day of judgment. Their pessimism was the outcome of 
their high ethical standards. But over against their social 
pessimism we have to put a moral optimism, also the 
product of their faith in the righteousness of God. They 
could not believe the Judge of all the earth would leave 

"Truth forever on the scaffold, Wrong forever on the 
throne." 
The right must eventually triumph. And so in spite of 
their apparent pessimism they maintained through wars 
and captivities and persecutions innumerable, through 
successive disappointments that would have daunted 
weaker men, a faith in the ultimate reign of God over all 
the universe. 

The moral and social idealism of the apocalyptists 
led many of them to break away from the narrow particu- 
larism of their contemporaries and to turn back toward 
the universalism of the prophets. Sad to say, this was 
not true of all. I En. 91 : 9 says, 

"And all the idols of the heathen shall be abandoned, 
And the temples burned with fire, 
And they shall remove them from the whole earth. 
And they (i. e. the heathen) shall be cast into the 

judgment of fire, 
And shall perish in wrath and in grievous judgment 

forever." 

But in the Similitudes we read, 

"He will cause the others (i. e., the sinners) to wit- 
ness (the judgment) 

That they may repent 

And forego the works of their hands. 

They shall have no honor through the name of the 
Lord of Spirits, 

Yet through His name shall they be saved, 

And the Lord of Spirits will have compassion on them, 

For His compassion is great." 1 

*I En. 50:2 f. 



136 The Promise of His Coming 

According to the Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs 
the twelve tribes are to be gathered along with the Gentiles, 
to whom God will reveal his salvation. Indeed he will 
reprove Israel by chosen ones from among the Gentiles. 1 
It was this universalism which paved the way for Paul 
and the Gentile mission of primitive Christianity. 

III. The General Character of Apocalypticism 

Prophecy was the mother of apocalypticism. In com- 
mon with the prophet the apocalyptist had an unconquer- 
able faith in God and an unswerving allegiance to the 
right. Their fundamental difference is that the apocalyp- 
tist is out of touch with life. Is it that his written and 
pseudonymous form of approaching the people prevents 
him from feeling their heart throbs? Or has he chosen 
that form because he was rather a theorist and a dreamer 
and an idealist than a stern, practical moralist and preacher 
of righteousness? Both, but the latter in particular, I be- 
lieve. He could have broken through the prejudice against 
spoken prophecy as John the Baptist did, had he pos- 
sessed the courage of John. It was his theory which led him 
to think the world hopelessly evil. It was his lack of 
touch with life that led him always to be looking for the 
day of the Lord in the future instead of acting in the liv- 
ing present. In many instances it led him to idealize 
his own people and to judge very harshly of the Gentiles. 
He was in danger either of fulminating against the im- 
moralities of people who were far off, or foretelling how 
evil people were to be in the last days, 2 instead of directly 
reproving his own generation and calling it to repentance. 
In particular the frequent chauvinism and particularism 

1 Benj. 9:2; 10:5, 10. 

2 1 do not overlook the fact that his descriptions of the last days are. 
usually pictures of what the writer saw in his own times. It 
is the indirection of his method that weakens him. 



General Character of Apocalypticism 137 

of apocalypticism stand in marked contrast to the liberal- 
ism and fairmindedness of the prophets. Joel and Amos 
both quote what was probably a Jewish proverb, "Yahweh 
shall roar from Zion, and utter his voice from Jerusalem." 1 
Joel makes that word mean salvation for Israel, whereas 
Amos makes it mean her punishment. Amos sees things 
as they are, Joel as he wishes them to be. This serves 
to illustrate the fundamental difference between mother 
and child. 

When, now, we come to summarize the development of 
eschatology during the six centuries following the Exile 
we discover great changes. 

(1) The idea of cosmic catastrophe in popular and pro- 
phetic apocalyptic we have seen to be a survival from 
early cosmogonies combined with mythological concep- 
tions of Yahweh as a nature god. Jewish apocalypticism 
inherited this idea, which had no essential place in pro- 
phetic eschatology, and under the influence of Babylonian 
and Persian cosmologies gave it a fundamental importance 
by uniting it with the Gnostic idea of the evil of matter. A 
good God could not rule an evil world. Therefore this 
earth must be purified and transformed by a cosmic mir- 
acle, or it must be destroyed. This conception appealed 
to the thoughtful, the philosophically inclined. 

(2) We find the apocalyptist looking out upon the 
world with a wider and wider horizon. The earliest apoca- 
lyptists speak of a world catastrophe in the day of Yahweh, 
but that is mere scenery. The real drama has to do only 
with Israel and her immediate neighbors. As time goes 
on, it comes to include literally the whole universe. 

(3) At the same time the individual comes to play a 
leading role. He is no longer merely one of the chorus. 
His personal salvation and his resurrection become mat- 
ters of profound moment. 

(4) Consequently there was a tendency to think of the 

1 Am. 1:2; Joel 3:16; cp. Jer. 25:30. 



138 The Promise of His Coming 

future in more transcendental terms, a tendency to make 
the national hope spiritual and otherworldly. 

(5) Likewise there was a tendency to systematize the 
apocalyptic doctrines into dogmas. But as yet no single 
system or point of view had come to dominate the Jewish 
nation. There were, however, certain lines of cleavage 
due to emphasis. One type of apocalypticism tended to 
think of the coming change in terms of social and political 
reform, the other looked for a great cosmic upheaval. 
Between the two extremes were almost innumerable 
nuances of combination. 1 

(6) On the whole apocalypticism followed in the foot- 
steps of Ezekiel, not only as to his prosaic imagination, 
his attitude toward earlier prophecy, and his particular- 
ism, but also as to his individualism. Not an Israel serving 
all the earth as in Second Isaiah, but one served by all 
the earth is the dominant hope. 

(7) In spite of the general tendency toward legalism, 
apocalyptic literature generally maintained the ethical 
and religious emphasis of prophecy. It thus bridges the 
gap between prophetic Judaism and Christianity, keeping 
alive the ideals which Jesus made the center of his mes- 
sage. 

One thing our brief survey must have made clear : apoca- 
lypticism presented to the Jew of Jesus' day anything but 
clear and consistent views. No apocalyptic system had as 
yet been worked out. Not only did individuals and parties 
differ greatly, but even the same writer used most incon- 
sistent language. The most diverse and contradictory 
ideas were incorporated in the same work. Materials 
adopted from foreign mythologies and religions or inher- 
ited from older writers are often most ambiguously used, 
and must have been as confusing to their original readers 
as they are to us. Therefore we face a very complex 
problem when we try to determine which of the many 

1 Points 2-5 are suggested by Schtirer, History of the Jewish People, 
II ii 129-137. 



General Character of Apocalypticism 139 

shades of apocalypticism was adopted by Jesus and the 
other early Christian leaders and writers, just as they had 
a very difficult problem to determine what belief to adopt 
and how to express it clearly to their contemporaries. We 
shall expect to find that the early Christian hope is not 
simple and single, but multiform, like that from which it 
sprang. 



CHAPTER VI 

THE KINGDOM AT HAND 

1. The Religious Situation in Jesus' Day 

THE religious situation in Jesus' day was much more 
complicated than we have been accustomed to think. 
Fresh investigations are bringing to light new parties and 
new subdivisions within those already known. The Essenes 
could not have exercised any profound influence upon 
Judaism. They were ascetic and philosophical, given to 
magical practices and non-Jewish rites, and they had al- 
most nothing to do with the origin of Christianity. 1 

The Sadducees were politicians and aristocrats, reject- 
ing the prophets and the future hope together. The Phari- 
sees, who made the study of the Scriptures their task and 
the keeping of the Law their delight, were a small group 
numerically, but extremely influential, since they had 
convinced the people that they alone fully represented 
true Judaism. The scribes, though not necessarily Phari- 
sees, were usually of that party. There were two tenden- 
cies among these students of the Law, one more liberal, the 
other more conservative, each represented in pre-Christian 
times by a leading rabbi, Hillel and Shammai, for ex- 
ample. Josephus recognizes a fourth "sect," the Zelots, a 
growing body in Jesus' time, who under the form of mes- 
sianic movements were promoting revolt against Rome. 
Recent discoveries have revealed a party of "Zadokites," 

1 See Schurer, Hist. Jew. People, II ii 205-218, and Conybeare in 
HDB I 767-772. Per contra see F. Legge, Forerunners and 
Rivals of Christianity (Cambridge, 1915), I 149-171. 

140 



Religious Situation in Jesus' Day 141 

a priestly group which accepted both prophetic and apoca- 
lyptic writings and looked for a messiah from " Aaron and 
Israel." 1 The Jerusalem Talmud says that at the time 
of the destruction of Jerusalem there were twenty-four 
kinds of heretics, 2 Jews who knew the Law but failed to 
keep it. Evidently Samaritans, Sadducees, Jewish Gnos- 
tics, and Jewish Christians were included in the list. 
Where did apocalypticism belong in relation to these 
parties ? 

The legalism of the scribes and Pharisees was the or- 
thodoxy of Jesus' day. The Pharisee was the ideal Jew 
even to the multitude whom he despised because they knew 
not the Law nor tried to keep it. The Law was the word 
of God, complete revelation of man's duties. Its accurate 
preservation and interpretation by the scribe was a matter 
of supreme importance, for only so could man learn how 
he ought to serve God. God no longer spoke to man, but 
the scribe was the authoritative interpreter of the au- 
thoritative Scripture. The scribes and Pharisees believed 
in the coming of the kingdom of God — in God's own good 
time. It was a matter with which they had nothing to do, 
except that the keeping of the Law rendered one fit to 
have a part in it. Indeed, if the impossible should ever 
happen and Israel really keep the Law, the Kingdom 
would immediately come. Later rabbis said that if all 
Israel should keep one Sabbath perfectly, the end would 
come. 3 The scribe's interest was in the Law, not in the 
prophets, and, for the most part, it was only a dull and 
academic attention he gave to the coming of the new age. 4 

As we have already seen, 5 the apocalyptic movement was 
the chief social and religious heterodoxy of Jesus' day. 

1 Charles, Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha, II 785-834. 

2 Sanh. x 5; JE VIII 594 f. 

3 Weber, Judische Theologie (Leipzig, 1897), p. 348 f. 

* Charles, Book of Jubilees (London, 1902), pp. xiii, li; Apocrypha 
and Pseudepigrapha, II 1, 407, 411; and especially, Apocalypse 
of Baruch (London, 1896), pp. 29 f., note on 15:5. 

B See above, pp. 92 ff. 



142 The Promise of His Coming 

Not that it was then a "sect" It was rather a "tendency," 
like German pietism or modern Premillennialism, affect- 
ing all sects and resulting in the formation of new ones. 
The question is occasionally asked why, aside from Daniel, 
the so-called apocalypses never got into the canon and so 
were not handed down as Scripture. There were several 
reasons : most of them were written late and most of them 
contain matter which would make us far more trouble to 
explain than the story of Jonah and the whale. In the 
main a true sense of intrinsic values, for which we may 
be profoundly grateful, guided the Jewish people in their 
choice of the books they should regard as divinely inspired. 
But another factor entered into the choice: the editing 
and preserving of the Scriptures were in the hands of the 
scribes, and they, the legalists, the orthodox, were against 
the heterodox apocalyptists. 1 

It is sometimes remarked that practically every evan- 
gelist known in America today accepts quite vigorously 
the belief in the speedy coming of Christ in visible fashion 
to the earth to establish the millennial kingdom. That is 
perfectly natural. The ancient apocalyptists were the 
enthusiasts, the revivalists of their day. In contrast to 
the self-righteous, self -centered ecclesiasticism of the Phar- 
isees, they viewed the religious situation with alarm. They 
believed in the Law as did the orthodox party, but they 
went farther. They felt that the people, outwardly fol- 
lowing the Pharisees, were really far from the true wor- 
ship of God. The writer of I En. 93 : 9 says of his own 
generation, "Many will be its deeds, and all its deeds will 
be apostate." The popular preacher who wishes to stir 
the multitudes finds his best ammunition in the sins of his 
age. Criticism of the existing situation, the raising of 
concrete problems in life and thinking, is the one means 

1 See above, pp. 97-100; cp. the remark of Oesterley, Apocrypha, p. 
199: "There is no doubt that the whole of this (apocalyptic) 
literature was rejected, ultimately, by the Palestinian Jewish 
authorities, the Pharisees." 



Religious Situation in Jesus' Day 143 

for inducing real thought, as the psychologists tell us. The 
apocalyptic evangelist, with his fundamental dogma of a 
present evil world, could let loose his woes against every- 
thing and everybody, as Enoch does in the immediate con- 
text of the verse just quoted. And against this back- 
ground, sufficiently awesome to any but the most sophisti- 
cated conscience, he could paint the still more moving 
terrors of the "wrath to come," and the glories of the new 
age that was to follow it. 

As we have already noted, political and social discontent 
among the Jews had no way in which to express itself ex- 
cept apocalypticism. The Zelots are a case in point. 
They were "waiting for the consolation of Israel," but 
they wished to work while they waited. No Zelot dreamed 
that Jewish arms could overthrow the Roman Empire. 
What they did believe was that God was not dead ; that if, 
trusting in him, they raised the standard of revolt, he 
must come to their aid against their enemies. They had 
suffered enough; the time of their redemption must be at 
hand. The Zelots were Pharisees and legalists — plus. 
They harbored a sense of social and religious wrongs, 
which fired them with an enthusiastic and fanatical faith 
that the Pharisees never could know. They were also 
apocalyptists plus. To the ardent dissatisfaction and fan- 
atical hope of apocalypticism they added a restless energy 
which insisted upon "direct action." Social unrest was, 
as ever, the active dynamite in the situation. Apoca- 
lypticism was the burning fuse which set it off. 

As the "people of the land" stood over against these 
parties, they bowed before the punctilious sanctity of the 
Pharisee and the sacred learning of the scribe. But it 
was the apocalyptist who warmed their hearts and stirred 
their enthusiasm. It was only the apocalyptist, and, 
above all, the Zelot, who had a program of action. There- 
fore, in Jesus' day, the multitude were constantly in danger 
of getting out of hand and going over to Zelotism. A 
generation after Jesus' death the opposition of official Ju- 



144 The Promise of His Coming 

daism was overwhelmed and even many of the rabbis be- 
came ardent revolutionists. 



II. Jesus and the Pkophets 

The question before us is, What was the attitude of 
Jesus toward these outstanding religious movements of 
his day? Here were two ideals of life, two philosophies 
of history, two views of the universe, not mutually exclu- 
sive and easily differentiated as viewed by men of that 
generation, but inextricably intertwined and confused, so 
that the modern student, with all the history of two thou- 
sand years before his eyes, with the verdict of posterity to 
help him, finds it difficult to disentangle the threads. Was 
Jesus able to see to the bottom of the turgid waters of 
partisan controversy and pick out the real pearls that lay 
hidden beneath the surface? And having done so, was 
he able to make their beauties clear to his contemporaries, 
who were far from seeing so clearly as he ? 

Another element in the problem was the political situa- 
tion and the relation of religion to politics. 1 The Sad- 
ducees were traitorous opportunists. The Pharisees were 
doctrinaire indifferentists, so long as their religion was not 
threatened. The Zelots were doctrinaire and fanatical 
revolutionists. Because both Pharisees and Sadducees 
were apathetic to the wrongs under which the people suf- 
fered, the Zelots were attracting a larger and larger fol- 
lowing. To the clear vision of Jesus it was evident that 
disaster lay ahead, unless some radically new, constructive 
program could capture the mind of the rank and file of 
the nation. There was need of something as attractive 
and inspiring as the fanaticism of the Zelots, with their 
promise of immediate emancipation from servitude to 
Pome and thorough righting of all wrongs, something that 

^■Sharman, The Teaching of Jesus about the Future (Chicago, 1909), 
pp. 109-120. S. Liberty, The Political Relationships of Christ's 
Ministry (Oxford, 1916). 



Jesus and the Prophets 145 

would counteract the legalism of the Pharisees and reform 
the abuses of the Sadducees. Where could such a program 
and the power to realize it be found? And how could it 
be put before the people so as to avoid the dangers of 
Zelotism ? 

While the answer to these questions is complicated, there 
is one element in it which is clear as day. Jesus did not 
belong to the orthodox party. There was no hope for the 
nation in Pharisaism. To be sure, he valued what was 
good in the Law. He came, not to destroy, but to fulfil it. 
Even the traditions, which, on the whole, he mercilessly 
assailed, had some good features in them. With regard 
to the petty tithing of mint, anise, and cummin, he could 
say, "These ye ought to have done, and not left the other 
(the matters of real righteousness) undone." What he 
fought against with all the strength of a clean conscience 
and a clear mind was the fallacy, which seems always to 
develop among lawyers, that the technicalities of law in 
themselves have some intrinsic value, entirely apart from 
the justice which they are supposed to promote. For 
Jesus, legalism, that puts the letter above the spirit, was 
anathema. He once said, "Woe unto you when all men 
speak well of you." It must have been a constant source 
of satisfaction to him that, from first to last, his staunchest 
opponents were found among the scribes and Pharisees. 
In so far as the Pharisees were loyal Jews he could ap- 
prove them, but that which was most characteristic in the 
whole scribal movement, its exaggerated traditionalism and 
reactionary legalism, stood solidly in the path of all reli- 
gious progress. What made the scribes and Pharisees, 
however, sons of their fathers who had killed the prophets 
was not their emphasis on the Law, but their indifference 
to the social wrongs and religious needs of the multitude, 
the substitution of legalism for righteousness. Jesus had 
no part with the scribes and Pharisees. 

Jesus was, then, decidedly unorthodox. Was his heter- 
odoxy of the apocalyptic type? Did reaction against le- 



146 The Promise of His Coming 

galism drive him into the opposite camp? To view this 
question in the proper perspective and answer it adequately, 
we must remember another ideal, which seemed likely to 
be completely forgotten by the majority of Jesus' contem- 
poraries, but which he recovered and made the very center 
of his own life and teaching, the prophetic conception of 
socialized religion. This, the highest view of man's rela- 
tionships, human and divine, which any people before him 
had conceived, he enriched out of the experience of his 
race during the centuries since the Exile and out of his 
own unique and profound insight into the heart of the 
Heavenly Father, and he made it the center of his thought 
and the criterion of his judgments of contemporary life. 

How far did the prophetic spirit lead him into opposi- 
tion to apocalypticism ? In general Jesus did not look at 
the world through the eyes of the apocalyptist. As we 
have seen, 1 the apocalyptic world view was pessimistic, de- 
terministic, mechanical, external, and literalistic. Jesus 
was none of these. He may occasionally seem to despair 
of a "disloyal and sinful generation/' and he knows that 
opposition, hardship, suffering, await both Master and dis- 
ciple. But his world is not evil and growing constantly 
worse. It is ruled by a loving Heavenly Father, who 
clothes the lily and "is kind even to the ungrateful and the 
evil." Jesus was not an ascetic, matter was not evil. 

He was not deterministic, mechanical, or external in 
his conception of morality and religion. Righteousness 
was not something that could be imposed from without. 
Rather it could be developed only from within, by human 
participation in God's purposes and labors. We may not 
be able to claim the support of the saying, "Lo, the king- 
dom of God is within you," 2 because of uncertainty as to 
translation, but that the kingdom was for Jesus primarily 
a matter of the heart needs no proof. It is for the hum- 
ble, the pure in heart, it must be received as a little child. 

1 See above, chap. V, sec. ii. 

2 Lk. 17:21; cp. Mofl'att's translation, "in your midst." 



Jesus and the Prophets 147 

Jesus seems to have had no belief that there were certain 
classes who were permanently excluded from the kingdom 
by birth or education or election. Only those who of their 
own free choice failed to do God's will would be cast out. 
Jesus was not literalistic in his use of the Old Testament. 
On the contrary he went back of the letter to the spirit of 
the word. Not the murderer merely, but the hater is con- 
demned. Even more than that, he actually abrogated the 
old command, "eye for eye, tooth for tooth," putting for- 
bearance and forgiveness in its place. Can one suppose 
for a moment that Jesus so valued the letter of prophecy 
that he would have insisted that it must all be fulfilled in 
detail, as the apocalyptist insisted ? Certainly no word of 
Jesus gives any basis for such a supposition and the spirit 
of his teaching points in exactly the opposite direction. 

Over against the thoroughgoing autocracy and external- 
ism of the apocalyptic world view, then, he put a thor- 
oughgoing spirituality and democracy. No kind of com- 
pulsion could make men good. Signs and miracles as such 
he entirely rejected. 

"If they will not listen to Moses and the prophets, 

they will not be convinced, not even if one rose from 

the dead." 1 
"Why does this generation demand a Sign ? 
I tell you truly, no Sign shall be given this genera- 
tion." 2 

Such language is fundamentally inconsistent with the 
expectation of the conversion of the world into the Realm 
of God by a cosmic catastrophe or the appearance of a 
Messiah of the Clouds. Likewise inconsistent with a 
catastrophic or supernaturalistic coming of the kingdom 
are certain of Jesus' sayings in his parables. We must be- 
ware of reading into the parables of the mustard seed and 
the leaven modern ideas of evolutionary progress. It may 
well be that the thought uppermost in Jesus' mind was 

1 Ui. 16:31. 
2 Mk. 8:12. 



148 The Promise of His Coming 

that the kingdom was coming surely and in a mysterious 
fashion, unobserved and unobservable to the multitude. 
But the fact remains that here we lose sight entirely of any 
sudden break between the present and the future. The 
parable of the soils belongs less distinctly in the same cate- 
gory. The first petition of the Lord's prayer, particularly 
as interpreted in Matthew, who is elsewhere strongly apoca- 
lyptic, also falls naturally into line with a historical and 
genetic rather than a catastrophic conception of the com- 
ing of the new age. "Thy reign begin, thy will be done 
on earth as in heaven" suggests no falling stars, parting 
heavens, or rending rocks. 

In another regard Jesus shows himself not a consistent 
eschatologist. In certain important aspects, the new age, 
the reign of God, has already begun. Jesus is already in- 
troducing the moral standards by which men are to live 
and by which they are to be judged. The powers of the 
kingdom are, therefore, already here also. Satan is mas- 
tered. 1 His demonic hosts are defeated. These facts are 
used specifically to prove the point that the kingdom is 
already here. "If it is by the finger of God that I cast 
demons out, then the Reign of God has reached you al- 
ready." 2 Moreover the strifes and divisions which must 
precede the new age are being unhappily realized in the 
lives of Jesus' family and followers. 3 The anticipated 
forerunner has come. 4 The overthrow of the proud and 
the exaltation of the humble are already beginning, for the 
Gospel is preached to the poor, and God is revealing him- 
self, not to the wise and learned, but to the simple-minded. 5 

If Luke IT : 21 may not be pressed as an argument for 

*Mk. 3:24-27; Lk. 10:18. 

2 Lk. 11:20; cp. 10:17 f. 

s Lk. 12:52 ff.=Mt. 10:34 f . ; cp. Mk. 13:12. 

*Mk. 9:12=Mt. 17:11 ff.; Mt. 11:14. It is worth remarking that 
the coming of Elijah, both in the Old Testament, Mai. 4:5 f., 
and in the Talmud (Weber, Jiid. Theol., pp. 352 ff.) is connected 
with a non-catastrophic coming of the kingdom. 

5 Lk. 7:22; 10:21. 



Jesus and the Prophets 149 

an internal kingdom, it nevertheless can hardly be twisted 
out of the plain implication that the kingdom is already 
here. If there were no other passages that indicated such 
a view, the saying might be doubtful, but there are several 
distinct claims on the part of Jesus that he is actually in- 
augurating the reign of God. When John asks, "Are you 
the Coming One ? Or are we to look for some one else Y 91 
his answer is unequivocal. The prophetic promises of 
the time of salvation are being fulfilled. Why should 
they look farther ? Jesus tells his disciples, 

"All has been handed over to me by my Father. . . . 
Blessed are the eyes that see what you see ! 
For I tell you many prophets and kings have desire^ 
to see what you see, 
but they have not seen it ; 
and to hear what you hear, 
but they have not heard it." 2 

When he raises the question, the disciples respond by 
plainly and emphatically acknowledging him to be the 
messiah. 3 His glory, to be sure, is not yet fully real- 
ized. 4 But we must remember that as yet no such idea 
as the "second coming" of the messiah had ever been con- 
ceived. The messianic triumph was still in the future, 
but the messiah was present with all the power in his 
hands that he wished to exercise. The day the ancients 
had seen by faith and longed to experience had come. 

As Professor von Dobschiitz, whom we have largely fol- 
lowed in the last two paragraphs, says, 

"The evidence collected is quite sufficient to prove 
that in the teaching of Jesus there is a strong line of 
what I should call transmuted eschatology. I mean 
eschatology transmuted in the sense that what was spoken 
of in Jewish eschatology as to come in the last days is 

*Lk. 7:19=Mt. 11:3. 

2 Lk. 10:22-24. 

3 Mk. 8:27-9:l=Mt. 16:13-28=Lk. 9:18-27. 

*Mk 10:37; 8:38. 



150 The Promise of His Coming 

taken here as already at hand in the lifetime of Jesus; 
transmuted at the same time in the other sense that what 
was expected as an external change is taken inwardly: 
not all people seeing it, but Jesus' disciples becoming 
aware of it. . . . And in His company they enjoy all 
the happiness of the Messianic time." 1 

Taking only these materials into account, we must con- 
clude that Jesus seems to have adopted the social idealism, 
the stern morality, and the religious fervor of the prophets 
and in that spirit to have used the language of apocalypti- 
cism. It is decidedly a "transmuted eschatology" which 
he gives us. 

If, in the light of this conclusion, we turn to the story 
of the Temptation in the Wilderness, our judgment is con- 
firmed. The account stands at the threshold of Jesus' 
ministry and likewise of the interpretation of his pur- 
poses. He has just come from his baptism with the cer- 
tain consciousness that he is to fulfil ancient prophecy and 
usher in the reign of God. What sort of a kingdom is it 
to be ? First he rejects the conception widely current 
among the people that it was to be principally meat and 
drink. He had not come to inaugurate a period of para- 
disiacal plenty, when men could eat without effort. 2 He 
would not experiment with turning stones into bread that 
he might later win a following from the multitude. Sec- 
ond, following the Lucan order, he had not come to re- 
establish the Davidic kingdom. He had no sympathy with 
the aims or methods of the Zelots. The subjugation of 
the kingdoms of this world was not synonymous with the 
establishment of God's reign. Finally he rejected the 
idea of a catastrophic interference from heaven, with an 
Enochic Messiah of the Clouds 3 whose angels should over- 
come the resistance of the wicked and the inertia of the 



1 Eschatology of the Gospels (London, 1910), pp. 150 f. 

2 See above, pp. 124. 

3 See above, pp. 126 f. 



Jesus and the Prophets 151 

indifferent, and, whether man would or no, set up the 
reign of God on earth. 1 

Jesus seems, then, to stand in the position of completely 
rejecting the ideals and hopes of apocalypticism and of be- 
ing entirely out of sympathy with its views of God, the uni- 
verse, and the future. What had he to put in their place ? 

To understand the distinctively new element which 
Jesus introduced into the conception of the kingdom and 
the messiah, one must attempt to look at Jesus' problem 
as it appeared to him and his disciples. How could Jesus 
claim to be the messiah, when everything in his life and 
surroundings seemed to contradict the immemorial ex- 
pectations of his people ? How could he define his posi- 
tion and that of his disciples to himself and to them? 
For his explanation he went back to the last and greatest 
of the real prophets of Israel, to Second Isaiah. 2 How 
far he was directly dependent we cannot be sure. He 
never expressly refers to the "suffering servant" or quotes 
the language of Isaiah on the subject, but he has plainly 
made the ideas of the ancient seer his own. 

The knowledge of God as Father was to emancipate the 
world and transform it into a realm of God. He alone 
who served and suffered could bring this divine "knowl- 
edge" into the hearts of men. All those who wished to 
enjoy a place in his realm must follow in his train. 3 This 
method, moreover, of bringing in the kingdom of God in- 
volved his own death. If all who wished to enter the king- 
dom must suffer, he who was supremely intrusted with the 
task of bringing it in must pour out his soul unto death. 
As Professor Selbie says, 

"In. the mind of Jesus His death bore a relation to 
human sin and need analogous to that attributed to 
the sacrifices and offerings of the old dispensation. 

1 See the writer's article, "The Temptation of Jesus Eschatologically 
and Socially Interpreted/' Biblical World, LIII 4 (July, 1919), 
402-407. 

* See above, pp. 73 ff. 

3 Mk. 10:35-45. 



152 The Promise of His Coming 

However far certain subsequent interpretations of the 
fact may take us from the actual mind of Christ, there 
can be no doubt that the whole conception originated 
with Him. The fact is the more remarkable because 
Jesus was not in any sense a gloomy ascetic. He knew 
and shared with other men the joy of living; but He 
knew, too, the deeper joy of redemption, sacrifice, and 
service." 1 

Curiously enough, the influence of these great innovating 
ideas of redemption of the Second Isaiah seemed to dis- 
appear with their author. Through all the history of 
Judaism, no one had responded to this great ideal of the 
unknown prophet of the Exile. Job, Jonah, the Psalms 
themselves, had never come to this vision of the meaning 
of suffering or this solution of the problem of the coming 
of the new age. In this more than anything else Jesus 
transcended his race and his age completely. In this more 
than anything else he signified himself entirely out of sym- 
pathy with the apocalyptic spirit. It knew nothing of the 
coming of God to the world by way of the cross. It knew 
nothing of suffering for the world, and above all for the 
foes of God and his elect. It knew nothing of going after 
the lost and erring and, by suffering for them, bringing 
them back to God. It knew nothing of washing away the 
sins of the world and of destroying sinners by transforming 
them willingly into children of God. It knew only a ter- 
rible day of vengeance, when all who were not within the 
fold should suffer the just deserts of their sins, a terrible 
catastrophe which by divine might should wipe out sinners 
and eradicate evil from the face of the whole earth. The 
ideal of the "suffering servant" more than anything else in 
the teaching of Jesus presents an element that is entirely 
irreconcilable with the apocalyptic conception of God's 
relation to mankind. 

Here also was a solution of the political problem. If 
Jesus' people could have seen themselves as the bearers of 

1 Aspects of Christ (Paris, n. d.), p. 139. 



The Apocalyptic Element 153 

God's message to the world by the path of suffering, if 
they could have seen that this message, carried in this 
manner, would eventually bring in, not the kingdom of 
which the apocalyptist dreamed, but the reign of God's 
will in the hearts of men — publicans and sinners, Greeks 
and Eomans, and all the rest, then they could have en- 
dured for a time Roman misrule ; and their own internal 
differences and the injustices which they suffered from 
one another would have disappeared, while they waited for 
the larger revelation of God in the world. They have had 
to suffer all down through the ages as no other race in 
history. Who would say they have not notably helped by 
those very sufferings in bringing to the world the knowl- 
edge of God. But they have fallen short of the supreme 
contribution because they have rejected Jesus, just as their 
so-called Christian persecutors have done. 

III. The Apocalyptic Element in the Teaching of 

Jesus 

If we were to stop here, the history of primitive Chris- 
tianity and of modern Premillennialism would be equally 
unintelligible. There are apocalyptic elements in the 
teachings of Jesus which have been too often overlooked 
or explained away. As we have seen, 1 Jewish apocalyp- 
ticism was a retrogressive movement, falling far below the 
level of prophecy in its religious spirit, its moral idealism, 
and, above all, its practical social applications. Yet it 
formed the sole connecting link between that former Au- 
gustan age of Hebrew religious achievement and Jesus' 
own time. It was the sole medium for the expression of 
political and industrial discontent and social aspiration. 
Probably no one could have been found among the whole 
people holding the ancient prophetic ideals who did not 
with them combine the apocalyptic-eschatological program. 

1 Above chap. V, sec. ii. 



154 The Promise of His Coming 

Even the scribes, although their whole outlook on life 
tended to still the spirit of prophecy, probably subscribed 
in general to the ethical ideals and the social hopes of the 
apocalyptists. One who wished to reform Judaism and 
reintroduce the prophetic religion would be obliged to look 
for support among those who were stirred by the apoca- 
lyptic spirit. He would be forced to find in the concepts 
and ideals of apocalypticism, which were perfectly famil- 
iar to all, the means for interpreting his own ideals to the 
people. Even if he chose to go back to the prophets and 
make use of their language and moral standards, he would 
have seemed to the people to use the language of apoca- 
lypticism, for the prophets were interpreted in an apoca- 
lyptic sense. 

The multitudes whom Jesus addressed, the disciples 
whom he chose, knew only the world view of the apocalyp- 
tist. There were no categories in which Jews could think, 
no language they could use in reference to the reform of 
society but those of apocalypticism. It was the one me- 
dium Jesus could use to present his message to his age. 

The prominence of the eschatological element in the 
teaching of Jesus would call for no emphasis were it not 
for the fact that so many people seem to read their 
Bibles with their eyes closed. ~No one can deny that the 
kingdom of God was the central theme of Jesus. His 
preaching begins with it : "The time has now come, God's 
reign is near: repent and believe in the gospel." 1 Most 
of his parables are introduced by the phrase, "the kingdom 
of God is like unto . . ." The first petition of the 
model prayer is "thy kingdom come." The superscrip- 
tion on his cross was "the king of the Jews." But what 
did he mean by the coming of the kingdom ? Again one 
cannot deny that he uses the language of the Jewish apoc- 
alyptist. The Son of man is to come "in the glory of his 

1 Mk. 1:15. 



The Apocalyptic Element 155 

father with the holy angels." 1 To the high priest Jesus 
said, "You will all see the Son of man sitting at the right 
hand of the Power and coining with the clouds of heaven."" 
It is not something in the far distant future to which he 
refers. "This adulterous and sinful generation" — it is a 
thoroughly apocalyptic phrase he uses — will soon be 
startled out of its indifference. "I tell you truly," Jesus 
said to his disciples, "there are some of those standing 
here who will not taste death till they see the coming 
of God's Reign with power." 3 Referring to various apoc- 
alyptic predictions he said, "I tell you truly, the present 
generation will not pass away till all this happens." 4 The 
disciples are exhorted, "Take care, keep awake and pray; 
you never know the time." 5 The Son of man was to 
come as suddenly as the lightning, as unexpectedly as a 
thief in the night or the Flood in the days of Noah. 6 We 
seem driven to conclude, with von Dobschutz, that there is 

"a large enough genuine stock of eschatological say- 
ings of Jesus to prove that He Himself believed in a 
change of all things which would come quickly, and 
not later than the end of His own generation ; the king- 
dom of God would then be established in its full glory 
and happiness by His own coming in power and glory." 7 

The most extensive body of materials in the gospels 
bearing upon eschatology is found in Mark 13 and the 
parallels in Matthew and Luke, containing the so-called 
"gospel apocalypse," better called Markan, because it came 
originally from that gospel. Within this chapter one set 
of verses (7, 8, 14-20, 24-29) stands quite by itself. 
When we turn to their study after reading the Jewish 
apocalypses, we cannot but be impressed by the very great 

1 Mk. 8:38. 

a Mk. 14:62. See I En. 62:5. 

3 Mk. 9:1. 

4 Mk. 13:30. 

5 Mk. 13:33. 

6 Mt. 24:26 f.=Lk. 17:23 f.; Mt. 24:43, 37==Lk. 12:39; 17:26 f. 

7 Eschatology of the Gospels, p. 123 f. 



156 The Promise of His Coming 

similarity. This group has exactly the tone and outlook 
of apocalypticism. Wars and rumors of wars, famines 
and earthquakes, followed by more terrible sufferings and 
catastrophes until the limit of endurance is reached, finally 
a universal cataclysm ; then the end with the Son of man, 
as in I En. 46, appearing on the clouds of heaven: there 
can be no doubt as to the affinities of such a picture. 
Almost every phrase can be paralleled in earlier apocalyp- 
tic literature. Moreover, these verses are in contradiction 
to other teachings of Jesus, for, whereas he plainly insists 
his coming is to be sudden and entirely unexpected, here 
we are told of various signs by which we may forecast it. 
He does not elsewhere teach that the world is to grow 
worse or that the end is universal disruption. 

The inconsistency of these verses with the teaching of 
Jesus elsewhere and their likeness to ordinary Jewish 
apocalyptic have led many scholars to the conclusion that 
they were not spoken by Jesus. As Dr. Muirhead has well 
said, "In a private conversation with two or three disciples 
Jesus would not speak in a sustained style of eschatological 
commonplace." 1 Read by themselves, these verses make 
a consistent whole. They are, therefore, regarded as an 
apocalyptic fly-sheet written by some Jewish Christian 
shortly before the destruction of Jerusalem and in the 
course of their circulation among the Christian congrega- 
tions of Palestine mistakenly attributed to Jesus. 2 We 

1 The Terms of Life and Death in the Old and New Testaments, (Lon- 

don, 1908), p. 136; cp. p. 123 f.; see Moffatt, Introduction to 
the Neic Testament (New York, 1914), pp. 207-209. For a fur- 
ther discussion of these verses see chap. VII, sec. ii. 

2 The question asked Jesus in Mk. 13:4 relates to the destruction 

of Jerusalem. That Jesus may have discussed this subject is 
probable. No Jew could believe that Jerusalem would be de- 
stroyed before the end of the world, and, therefore, would connect 
any pronouncement on the latter subject with the former (cp. 
Mk. 13:1-4 with Mt. 24:1-3.) Hence the inclusion of the "apoca- 
lyptic fly-sheet" with Jesus' discourse on the destruction of 
Jerusalem. 



The Apocalyptic Element 157 

therefore reach the conclusion that we cannot use these 
verses to determine his thought. 

If this Markan apocalypse is excised, there still remains 
a large number of passages in this chapter and elsewhere 
in the gospels which show that Jesus was thoroughly at 
home in the apocalypses. From such passages it would 
appear that he taught substantially as follows: 

(1) Persecution and suffering are to be the lot of his 
disciples for a time ; vindication and reward are to follow. 
"Look to yourselves . . . You will be hated by all men on 
account of my name; but he will be saved who holds out 
to the very end." 1 

(2) He is the "Son of man/' now preaching and heal- 
ing and suffering ; eventually to return in divine power to 
inaugurate the kingdom of God in its full manifestation. 2 

(3) False prophets will continually arise to proclaim 
the nearness of his advent for this purpose, 3 but they will 
invariably be mistaken, for he will appear suddenly and 
unexpectedly: no one can tell the time in advance. 4 

(4) Yet he is to come very soon, within the lifetime 
of his contemporaries. 5 

(5) He will come in glory, on the clouds, with the 
angels, sitting at the right hand of power, thus combining 
the ideal human messiah of the Psalms of Solomon with 
the supernatural Son of man of Enoch, the first in his 
present earthly life, the second in the age to come. 6 



*Mk. 13:9-13. 

2 Mk. 8:28-9:1. 

3 Mk. 13:5 f. 21-23- Lk. 17:20-23. 

*Mk. 13:32;'Mt. 24:37 ff.=Lk. 1*7:26-29; Mt. 24:26 f.=Lk. 17-23 f. 
If there is one thing above anotheT which the eschatological 
teaching of Jesus emphasizes, it is that it is absolutely futile 
to attempt to prognosticate when he will appear. It is con- 
trary both to the letter and to the spirit of his teaching to 
trv to calculate the time of his coming, or even to forecast it. 
See Mk. 13:6, 32 f. 

6 Mk. 13:30; 9:1; 14:25, 62. 

e Mk. 8:38; 14:62. 



158 The Promise of His Coming 

(6) His coming will bring judgment, purely on moral 
lines. 1 

These views are inconsistent with the "apocalyptic fly- 
sheet" which Mark incorporated into the gospel, and with 
much early and modern Christian teaching on the subject. 
But they are consistent within themselves and they do not 
contradict the prophetic principles, which, as we have 
seen, Jesus made the center of his life and message. How 
now are we to interpret these sayings in view of the de- 
velopment of apocalypticism before Jesus and the subse- 
quent history of Christianity and the world ? 



IV. The Meaning of Jesus' Apocalyptic Language 

Many ways of dealing with the apocalyptic material in 
the teachings of Jesus have been found. 

(1) The premillennial view, which takes all that Jesus 
said literally, will be discussed more fully in the next 
chapter. Here it is enough to say that its literalism is as 
contrary to the spirit of Jesus as it is to that of modern 
historical inquiry, and furthermore, that both the Bible 
and nineteen centuries of history contradict its fundamen- 
tal propositions. 

(2) Another method is to distinguish between the say- 
ings of Jesus, particularly in Mk. 13, noting that the 
original question had to do only with the overthrow of 
Jerusalem. This was what his own generation was to 
experience. To this prediction were added other genuine 
sayings which can be fulfilled only in the final destruction 
of the world and his coming literally as depicted on the 
clouds of heaven. Part of the passage thus has been ful- 
filled, part awaits fulfillment. This view is essentially 
premillennial. It escapes the objections merely to certain 

1 Mk. 13:33-37; Mt. 24:42-51=Lk. 12:39-46; Mt. 25:1-46; etc. 



Jesus' Apocalyptic Language 159 

details of that interpretation ; otherwise it is as impossible 
as the balder premillennialism. 1 

(3) Many would adopt the same attitude toward all 
the apocalyptic material in the gospels that we have taken 
toward the "little apocalypse" of Mark 13. It is all sup- 
posed to be interpolated into the teaching of Jesus by his 
disciples, who were themselves so thoroughly apocalyptic 
that they entirely misunderstood Jesus and ascribed to him 
language that he never used. 

(4) More satisfactory to some is the theory that Jesus 
did use practically all the language ascribed to him, but 
in different connections and contexts from those given in 
our present gospels, so that his meaning was not what it 
is made to appear by the grouping in which we now find 
his words, the present arrangement being due to this same 
misunderstanding on the part of his disciples. 

We cannot deny that to some extent his disciples mis- 
understood and misreported Jesus. But both these theories 
prove too much. They are both open to the same objec- 
tions : first, that they set up modern, occidental standards 
by which to judge the ancient, oriental Jesus, and, second, 
that they completely undermine the trustworthiness of our 
gospel records and throw us back upon purely subjective 
reconstructions of the character and teachings of the Mas- 
ter. On either theory, the disciples, in reporting Jesus, 
made him a man after their own heart. The modern 
scholar counters by making a Jesus after his own heart, 
and we have nothing left upon which we may depend. The 
reductio ad absurdum of this method of writing history is 
found in the "Christ-myth theory" of Drews, Smith, and 
Robertson. 2 Most people will prefer the disciples' recon- 
struction to an equally arbitrary modern one. 

1 For a statement and criticism of this view see M. S. Terry, Biblical 

Apocalyptics (New York, 1898), pp. 217 ff. 

2 See Drews, The Christ-Myth (Chicago, [1911], translated from the 

3rd German ed. of 1910). On the other side see F. C. Cony- 
beare, The Historical Christ, etc. (Chicago, 1914) ; S. J. Case, 
The Historicity of Jesus (Chicago, 1912). 



100 The Promise of His Coming 

(5) The theory according to which the language of 
Jesus is to be interpreted figuratively has much to recom- 
mend it. But again, it suffers from lack of historical 
criteria by which it may be tested, as does all figurative, 
or allegorical, interpretation. It overlooks the fact that 
the literal and the figurative were not carefully distin- 
guished by the ancient — or modern — oriental. It inclines, 
like the third and fourth theories above, to make Jesus 
too modern. It does not reckon with the importance of 
the apocalyptic way of thinking in Jesus' time. The view 
according to which Jesus was foretelling literally the over- 
throw of Jerusalem and figuratively the progress of Chris- 
tianity after that great crisis is open to the same, if not 
more serious, objections. 1 

The most serious objection to all these methods of inter- 
pretation is that they ignore or in many cases were elabo- 
rated in ignorance of Jewish apocalyptic literature. This 
objection applies even more to the literalistic and pre- 
millennial theories than it does to the critical attempts. 
All these theories, both literalistic and critical, are under 
suspicion of looking at Jesus through modern eyes, not 
taking into account the actual state of thought and feeling 
in the times when he lived. The thought of Jesus cannot 
be reproduced for us except as we put ourselves at once in 
the atmosphere of both prophet and apocalyptist. If we 
attempt to do that, we shall at least come nearer to "the 
mind of Christ." 

Those who cannot believe that Jesus ever used and in- 
tended literally such language as we find ascribed to him 
overlook the uniqueness and incomprehensibility of genius. 
At best they make the Master only a more glorified Peter 
or John, a Jewish superprophet. If they are gifted neither 
with historical imagination nor a sense of humor — both are 
sometimes lacking to students of theology — they pare him 
down to what they can imagine themselves doing under the 
1 Cp. M. S. Terry, Biblical Apocalyptics, pp. 213-252. 



Jesus Apocalyptic Language 161 

given circumstances. No great leader of men does under 
the strain and stress of conflict when world issues are at 
stake what the scholar at his study table, peering through 
his myopic glasses, would consider the wise and sane thing 
to do. Great occasions demand great men. Movements 
of power demand words of power. Great opportunities 
demand great vision. Jesus has moved the world as has 
no other individual in the course of history. Can we re- 
strict him to the kind of language and the kind of thoughts 
of which we are capable ? The uniqueness of Jesus de- 
manded unique expression. Should he give himself out 
to be a Hercules come to labor again on earth, or a Hermes 
come to lead souls to heaven ? Manifestly absurd ! Should 
he call himself simply the messiah? To the Pharisee or 
Sadducee that would have been as objectionable as Her- 
cules or Hermes, perhaps more so. And it would have 
led to more serious complications with the multitude, 
for to them the title would have implied revolt against 
Rome, the restoration of the Davidic monarchy. How 
could he convey to the minds of men his conception of his 
mission? He chose to call himself the Son of man, and 
with the title to combine the language of Daniel and 
Enoch, and perhaps other, to us unknown apocalypses, 
describing the advent and achievements of this imposing 
character. What did such language mean to him and what 
does it means to us ? 

Jesus' self -consciousness, his estimate of his person and 
his mission, was unique. No sane human being, either 
before or since his time, has been able to use such a lan- 
guage of himself as he did. What does it imply ? First, 
that he felt that he himself and no other was to realize 
the age-long expectations of his people. He was to in- 
augurate the reign of God. Under the circumstances of 
his baptism, the voice from heaven, "Thou art my beloved 
Son/' connoted a unique commission and consequently a 
unique relation to God. Therefore, he was the messiah. 
But, second, he was not merely a human king of the Da- 



162 The Promise of His Coming 

vidic line, rather something far above that. With Daniel 
and Enoch behind him, no Jew could use the title "Son of 
man" without connoting a relationship to God which no 
human being has ever claimed. 1 

When one puts together the three terms, Son of God, 
messiah, and Son of man, all of them titles which Jesus 
used or accepted as his by right, one must recognize that 
Jesus made a claim to a unique position in relation to 
God, man, and history. As the Enochic Son of man comes 
on the clouds of heaven and sits on the throne of judg- 
ment and glory, Jesus is to rule and judge. As all evil 
is to flee before that Son of man and all men are to wor- 
ship him, so Jesus will eventually triumph. As the Son 
of man is to win a purely spiritual victory, so also will 
Jesus. As the Enochic Son of man is second only to God, 
so Jesus stands above all others as uniquely the "Son of 
the Father." Accepting the term Son of man in its apoc- 
alyptic meaning, one is driven to the conclusion that Jesus 
claimed a relation to God as his Son which can best be 
described by using the term which all the ages have allowed 
him as his due; he was divine. If we find him in other 
respects the "crystal Christ," then we must allow this 
claim of his and give him the worship and honor which 
the claim implies. In the light of Jewish usage Son of 
man constitutes a higher claim than Son of God. The 
interpretation of Jesus in the light of apocalypticism rein- 
forces in an unexpected manner the "orthodox" view of 
his person. 

The apocalyptic language of Jesus, then, may be said to 
record his self-consciousness, his faith in himself. Still 
more truly may it be said to record his faith in God and 
in man. Without any preliminary of apostasy and degen- 
eration, of tempest and earthquake, of darkened sun and 
falling stars, his enemies and his own should see him com- 
ing on the clouds of heaven. The cause for which he and 
1 See above, pp. 126 ff. 



Jesus' Apocalyptic Language 163 

his little band of despised followers stood, the glad tidings 
to the poor, the meek, the suffering, deliverance to cap- 
tives, the opening of blind eyes, should triumph, and that 
not in the far distant future, but even within that genera- 
tion. Those who opposed him with their way of thinking 
and living should be judged in cataclysmic fashion. They 
themselves should see it. Secrets should be revealed; the 
inner character of men and movements should be made 
clear, when the day of his "apocalypse," his revealing, 
should come. Only the language of apocalypse could ex- 
press the certainty, the vividness, the overwhelming power 
of this faith in the heart of Jesus. 

"Whoever is ashamed of me and my words in this 
disloyal and sinful generation, the Son of Man will be 
ashamed of him when he comes in the glory of the 
Father with the holy angels. I tell you truly," he said 
to them, "there are some of those standing here who 
will not taste death till they see the coming of God's 
reign with power. . . . You will all see the Son of Man 
sitting at the right hand of the Power and coming with 
the clouds of Heaven." 1 

The title "Son of man" connoted for Jesus, however, 
not only the certainty of victory, but the path by which 
it was to be won. It cannot be shown that the phrase had 
been used especially to emphasize human weakness and 
frailty, though it does seem to be employed in Ezekiel 2 
with something of that suggestion. Yet it appears re- 
peatedly in the gospels in connection with references to 
Jesus' service and suffering. 3 It seems hardly possible 
that such constant collocation of the title with these ideas, 
which, as we have seen, 4 were Jesus' unique contribution 
to the idea of the work of messiah, can be merely acci- 
dental. The title "Son of man" Jesus fills with the double 

^Ik. 8:38-9:1; 14:62. 

2 2:1, 3, 6, 8; 3:1, 4; 4:1; 37:3: etc. 

3 Mk. 2:10; Lk. 6:22; 7:34; 9:58; Mk. 8:31; 9:9, 12, 31; 10:33, 45; 

Lk. 19:10; etc. 
*See above, pp. 151 ff. 



1 64 The Promise of His Coming 

meaning of cross and crown, whether before him it had 
that wealth of signification or not. In any case it is quite 
plain that, firmly as Jesus believed in the coming of the 
reign of God, he believed with equal certainty that it could 
come only by the method of suffering and service. The 
path to victory passed over Golgotha. And Jesus freely 
chose to follow that path. The title embodies the cer- 
tainty of his faith, the unreservedness of his devotion, the 
fullness of his courage. He was willing to make the su- 
preme sacrifice in order that God might reign in the hearts 
of men and the world of humankind. 

Since it implies this, the phrase also defines his attitude 
toward Zelotism or any conception of the kingdom which 
was purely material and external. Only divine power 
could lead men to the course of action which he deemed 
essential to the coming of the kingdom. The coming of 
the Son of man on the clouds, which implied a heavenly, 
supernatural coming of the kingdom, was the obvious way 
for him to express his conception of the manner of its 
realization. It made it perfectly clear that he was not 
planning revolt against Rome. The kingdom was to be 
spiritual before it could be social, an internal power before 
it could bear external fruit. It must win its victories by 
spiritual forces. 

In contradistinction to the easy-going quietism of the 
Pharisees, Jesus proclaimed the kingdom as the one pearl 
worth having, the one treasure worth seeking; one should 
be willing to sacrifice an eye or a hand for it, nay, life 
itself; one ought always to pray and not to faint, until 
God should avenge his importunate elect. Jesus could not 
sit down and wait for a far-off divine event, to which the 
whole creation moves with ordered, unhurried evolution. 
The kingdom of God must come by conflict. It is not true 
that it can come easily, by a gradual growth, or by the 
faithful keeping of God's laws. Men cannot sleep and 
rise night and day, while it grows like the grain. It will 
continue to grow no matter what this or that man may do, 



Jesus' Apocalyptic Language 165 

for God's purposes are sure, and some day righteousness 
will triumph. But there must be many a conflict with 
the powers of evil, many a crisis, many a catastrophe to 
help it on its march. Therefore, there was full justifica- 
tion, also, for the element of the catastrophic which Jesus 
introduced into his conception of the kingdom. 

But the question still remains : Did Jesus really believe 
that after his death he would come again visibly to reign 
on earth? Did he really expect his own second coming? 
Did he use the language of apocalypticism literally or fig- 
uratively ? We must beware of demanding of an oriental 
nineteen centuries ago a literal accuracy in the use of lan- 
guage which one expects in a modern scientific treatise. 
Jesus was a prophet, a poet, an oriental, an ancient. The 
language of apocalypticism met his needs, satisfied his 
faith, and expressed his feelings better than any other that 
was available. We cannot suppose that he deliberately 
used language in a figurative sense when he knew that his 
disciples would understand it literally. ISTor can we sup- 
pose that he consciously accommodated himself to their 
poorer and less spiritual views, when all the time he was 
fully aware of the real truth. This implies a certain dis- 
ingenuousness which does not comport with the crystal 
purity of his life. 

It were better to admit that his humanity involved cer- 
tain limitations, that just as he was limited to the language 
of his people and the unscientific ideas of his time, so in 
this matter he was "limited" to the highest and most spir- 
itual of the messianic conceptions of his age and used lan- 
guage which did not express the full truth. Though per- 
haps dimly conscious that it was unsatisfactory he used it 
because, perforce, there was no other language to use. At 
least one can say with Fathers Loisy and Tyrrell 1 that 
the language of apocalypticism presents great truths in 

1 Loisy, The Gospel and the Church (New York, 1904), pp. 120 f.; 
Tyrrell, Christianity at the Cross Roads (London, 1910), pp. 87, 
94, 100 flf. 



166 The Promise of His Coming 

powerful symbols, the most powerful that could be em- 
ployed at that time, or, for that matter, since. We ex- 
press the same truths more intellectually or rationally, 
perhaps, but not more vigorously or appealingly. 

The result of the study of Jesus' teaching is to leave 
us with two contradictory elements only partially synthe- 
sized in the gospel records, perhaps even in his own think- 
ing not fully fused. There was an apocalyptic element, 
which to most minds connoted a certain external, mechan- 
ical scheme of the future, and a prophetic element, which 
was spiritual and internal as well as social. That any 
real genius, any virile leader in the world's thinking, is 
consistent, the study of philosophy and religion has long 
ago disproved. Every such pioneer solves certain prob- 
lems but overlooks others, and even creates new ones, leav- 
ing them behind for his successors. Jesus has done more 
to solve the problems of the world, both theoretical and 
practical, than any one else who has ever lived. But there 
are still problems left and apocalypticism is one of them. 
That down through all the ages there have persisted, side 
by side, two views of the future outcome of his work, one 
millennarian, the other social and spiritual, is proof enough 
of the contradiction within his teaching. We shall go on 
in the two subsequent chapters to discuss these views as 
they appear in the New Testament and primitive Chris- 
tianity, and thus try to obtain a clearer view of what Jesus 
meant. 



CHAPTEE VII 
A LIVING AND BLESSED HOPE 
I. The Primitive Apostolic Faith 

WHEN one turns from Jesus to his immediate follow- 
ers, the profound influence of Jewish apocalypti- 
cism is at once apparent. Not that the prophetic spirit is 
wanting, but it seems everywhere to have been mediated by 
the apocalyptic movement and to have taken on the charac- 
teristic coloring of the latter. It is plain that all Jesus' 
earliest followers had been firm believers in Jewish apoca- 
lyptic. Sympathy with the poor and oppressed, the ex- 
pectation of a tremendous reversal of conditions which 
should overthrow the rich and powerful and elevate the 
weak and humble, the certainty that wickedness would be 
judged and punished and righteousness recognized and re- 
warded, the faith that all this was to be wrought by a 
supernaturalistic, catastrophic interference from heaven, 
and the vivid confidence that it was to happen in the im- 
mediate future — all these outstanding characteristics of 
the primitive Christian hope mark it as derived directly 
from apocalypticism. 

There are various marks which distinguish this early 
Christian hope from the usual forms of Jewish eschatology. 
Little is said about the world growing worse. Sins are 
seen and rebuked. But the end is so near, the need of 
repentance so pressing, the opportunity of forgiveness and 
the hope of salvation so glorious, that there is no time for 
evils to grow worse and worse, no inclination to paint a 
gloomy picture of the present. So vivid was their faith, 

167 



168 The Promise of His Coming 

so sustaining their hope, that one cannot speak of pessi- 
mism in connection with those early Christians. More- 
over their expectation of the speedy realization of their 
hopes was clouded by no uncertainty. They were already 
living in the last days. The Spirit, specifically promised 
to be poured out after the restoration of all things, 1 was 
already here, a foretaste of the glories that should follow. 
They might at any time, then, expect to see the other, ter- 
rible portents which belonged to the last days, the sun 
turned into darkness and the moon into blood. 2 Joel's 
confused order of the last events of the present age caused 
them no difficulty, for in another particular they had de- 
parted far more significantly from the accepted views as 
to the coming of the kingdom — in their view of the "second 
advent" of Christ. 

The one thing that above all others distinguished the 
faith of the early Christians from that of their Jewish 
fellow enthusiasts was their contention that Jesus, who 
had taught in Galilee and died on the cross at Jerusalem, 
was the messiah. By his marvelous deeds, his sufferings, 
death, and resurrection, he had proved his claim and won 
to himself the right to come in the fashion of the Enochic 
Son of man on the clouds of heaven, and, when he did so 
come, he would judge the world, punishing the unbelieving 
and sinful, rewarding all who had put their trust in him, 
and inaugurating the reign of God. This was the es- 
sence of the evangelion, the glad tidings, that through the 
return, the second coming of Jesus the Christ, salvation 
was to come to all those who were suffering in this present 
evil age. The "second coming" was, then, the means of 
explaining away the reproach of the cross. Only by death 
and resurrection could the man Jesus become the super- 
natural, divinely glorious Judge. It is a unique testi- 
mony to the power of Jesus' personality that his disciples, 
men and women who had walked and talked and eaten 

^oel 2:21-30. 
2 Joel 2:31. 



The Primitive Apostolic Faith 169 

with him, could believe that he deserved such a distinc- 
tion. It is a testimony, also, to the influence of Jewish 
apocalypticism on their thinking that they were able to 
find no other category under which to subsume their im- 
pression of that personality. That is not surprising, how- 
ever, for, as we have seen, Jesus had found himself driven 
to the same language to express his consciousness of his 
person and mission. In this they demonstrated themselves 
to be his true disciples. 

To obtain any sure basis for an interpretation of the 
Christian hope of the future, it is necessary to study 
briefly the views which are presented by the various New 
Testament writers. We begin with the book of Acts, not 
because it was the earliest written, but because it alone 
records the history of the Christian body during the two 
decades immediately following the death of Jesus. It is 
a striking confirmation of our estimate of the importance 
of the apocalyptic way of thinking in the foundation of 
Christianity, that this book, written one or perhaps two 
generations after Jesus' crucifixion by an educated Greek 
physician who might be expected to have no understanding 
or sympathy for such doctrines, records so faithfully those 
apocalyptic traits which marked Jesus and the other New 
Testament writings. The chief source of the joy and 
power of these first pilgrims in "the Way" was the Spirit 
which in accordance with the promise had been sent into 
their hearts. The Spirit meant to them two things : first, 
an inward buoyancy and feeling of power because of the 
sense of the divine presence; and, second, a hopefulness 
and an indifference to difficulty and danger because the 
Spirit was an assurance that they were already in the last 
times and that Jesus must speedily return to "restore the 
Eealm to Israel." The theory of the "second coming" 
must have been born immediately after the resurrection, 
for there were no other explanations hazarded by any early 
Christians which, to a Jewish apocalyptist, would reconcile 
the messiahship of Jesus with his death. Even though we 



170 The Promise of His Coming 

might theoretically doubt Luke's ability to find reliable 
sources and accurately report them, the words of Peter in 
the Temple ring true to our expectations : 

"The God of our fathers has glorified Jesus his 
servant, whom you delivered up and repudiated before 
Pilate. . . . You killed the pioneer of Life. But God 
raised Him from the dead. . . . This was how God 
fulfilled what He had announced beforehand by the 
lips of all the prophets, namely the sufferings of His 
Christ. Eepent then, and turn to have your sins blotted 
out, so that a breathing-space may be vouchsafed you, 
and that the Lord may send Jesus your long-decreed 
Christ, who must be kept in Heaven till the period of the 
great Kestoration." 1 

The first Christian whose writings have come down to 
us intact is Paul. Paul was a Pharisee, educated in the 
rabbinical school at Jerusalem. If our estimate of Jewish 
legalism is correct, 2 he probably was opposed to the Jewish 
apocalyptic movements or at least not interested in them, 
although, no doubt, familiar with their characteristic fea- 
tures. Perhaps one of the elements of Christianity which 
made his persecution the more bitter and his conversion 
the more difficult was his adherence to the cold legalism of 
his scribal teachers and his dislike of the unbridled en- 
thusiasm and irregularity of apocalypticism. If so, when 
he was converted, the change was complete. His descrip- 
tion of his hope in I Thessalonians is the most apocalyptic 
of all the New Testament outside the Book of Revelation. 

"We would like you, brothers, to understand about 
those who are asleep in death. You must not grieve 
for them, like the rest of men who have no hope. Since 
we believe that Jesus died and rose again, then it fol- 
lows that by means of Jesus God will bring with Him 
those who have fallen asleep. For we tell you, as the 
Lord has told us, that we, the living, who survive till 

1 Ac. 3:13-21. 

2 See above, pp. 92-96, 140-143. 



The Primitive Apostolic Faith 171 

the Lord comes, are by no means to take precedence of 
those who have fallen asleep. The Lord Himself will 
descend from Heaven with a loud summons, when the 
archangel calls and the trumpet of God sounds; 1 the 
dead in Christ will rise first; then we the living, who 
survive, will be caught up along with them in the 
clouds to meet the Lord in the air, and so we shall be 
with the Lord for ever. ... As regards the course 
and periods of time, brothers, you have no need of being 
written to. You know perfectly well that the day of 
the Lord comes like a thief in the night; when 'all's 
welF and 'all is safe' are on the lips of men, then all 
of a sudden Destruction is upon them, like pangs on a 
pregnant woman — escape there is none. But, brothers, 
you are not in the darkness for the Day to surprise you 
like thieves; you are all sons of the Light and sons of 
the day. . . . For God destined us not for Wrath, but 
to gain salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ, who 
died for us that waking in life or sleeping in death we 
should live together with him/' 2 

It would appear that the Thessalonian brethren put the 
wrong emphasis on these words of Paul. They understood 
him to say that the coming of the Lord was to be momen- 
tarily expected, and many, therefore, gave up their usual 
avocations to wait for his advent. Consequently, in a sec- 
ond letter, he was compelled to elaborate his eschatology 
further. He finds occasion early in this missive to call 
attention to the reward of the righteous and the punish- 
ment of the wicked in that great day: 

"All the persecutions and the troubles in which you 
are involved . . . are proof positive of God's equity; 
you are suffering for the realm of God, and he means to 
make you worthy of it — since God considers it but just 

1 Cp. I Co. 15:52; an idea originating in the Old Testament use of 
the trumpet to call the people to worship and to war; first 
apocalyptically used in Ex. 19:16; Jer. 51:27; Is. 27:13; Ps. 
Sol. 11:1, 3; cp. Plummer, Exegetical Commentary on the Gospel 
of Matthew (London, 1909), pp. 336 f. 

2 1 Th. 4:13-5:10. 



172 The Promise of His Coming 

to repay with trouble those who trouble you, 
and repay you who are troubled (as well as us) 
with rest and relief, 
when the Lord Jesus is revealed from Heaven 
together with the angels of His power in flaming 
fire, 
to inflict punishment on those who ignore God, 
even on those who refuse obedience to the gospel 
of our Lord Jesus, 
men who will pay the penalty of being destroyed 

eternally 
from the presence of the Lord 

and from the glory of his might, 
when He comes to be glorified in His saints 
and to be marvelled at in all believers 
on that day." 1 

Then he turns to their special difficulty. The Lord is 
surely coming, and that within their lifetime, but the 
time is not yet. 

"With regard to the arrival of the Lord Jesus Christ and our 
muster before him, I beg you, brothers, not to let your minds 
get easily unsettled or excited by any spirit of prophecy or any 
declaration or any letter purporting to come from me, to the 
effect that the Day of the Lord is already here. Let nobody 
delude you into this belief, whatever he may say. It will not 
come till the Rebellion takes place first of all, with the re- 
vealing of the Lawless One, the doomed One, the adversary who 
vaunts himself above and against every so-called god or object 
of worship, actually seating himself in the temple of God with 
the proclamation that he himself is God. Do you not remem- 
ber I used to tell you this when I was with you? Well, you 
can recall now what it is that restrains him from being re- 
vealed before his appointed time. For the secret force of law- 
lessness is at work already; only, it cannot be revealed till he 
who at present restrains it is removed. 

Then shall the Lawless One be revealed, 

whom the Lord Jesus will destroy with the breath of 

his lips 
and quell by his appearing and arrival — 



X 1I Th. 1:4-10. 



The Primitive Apostolic Faith 173 

that One whose arrival is due to Satan's activity, 

with the full power, the miracles and portents, of 

falsehood, 
and with the full deceitfulness of evil for those who are 
doomed to perish, 
since they refuse to love the Truth that would save them. 
Therefore God visits them with an active delusion, 

till they put faith in falsehood, 
so that all may be doomed who refuse faith in the Truth 
but delight in evil." 1 
It would appear that by the Lawless One he means the 
Antichrist and that the restraining power is the Roman 
Empire, which is delaying the coming crisis until the elect 
may be evangelized. 

We have here a piece of apocalypticism such as appears 
nowhere in Jesus' teachings and in no other extant letter 
of Paul. Evidently it is a current belief which Paul ac- 
cepted for a time at least. Elsewhere he seems to think 
only of the nearness of the expected change and to hope 
that it may come within his own lifetime. Five or six 
years after the Thessalonian correspondence he writes to 
the Corinthians, 

"Considering the imminent distress in these days, it 
would be an excellent plan for you (the unmarried) 
to remain as you are. ... I mean, brothers, 
the interval has been shortened ; 
so let those who have wives live as if they had none, 
let mourners live as if they were not mourning, 
let the joyful live as if they had no joy, . . . 
for the present phase of things is passing away." 2 

Only a year or two later he writes the Romans, 

"And then you know what this Crisis means, you 
know it is high time to waken up ; for Salvation is nearer 
to us now than when we first believed. It is far on 
in the night, the day is almost here." 3 

'II Th. 2:1-12. 

2 1 Co. 7:26-31. 

3 13:11 f. 



174 The Promise of His Coming 

Something seems to have happened to persuade him that 
the end is nearer than he originally supposed. 

Paul did not again use such definite language. But in 
one of his latest letters, written perhaps only a few months 
before his death, he says, 

"We are a colony of Heaven, and we wait for the 
Savior who comes from Heaven, the Lord Jesus Christ, 
who will transform the body that belongs to our low 
estate till it resembles the body of his Glory, by the same 
power that enables him to make everything subject to 
Himself." 1 

"The Lord is at hand," 2 

Paul's faith as to the future, as it may be deduced from 
the fugitive and incomplete materials in his letters, seems 
to have been as follows : 

(1) Jesus' resurrection and ascension proved him to 
have been the messiah (Eo. 1:4). 

(2) He had thus openly triumphed over the demonic 
powers, but the victory was not yet complete (Col. 2 :15 ; 

1 Co. 15:23-26, 54). 

(3) When all the elect among the Gentiles had been 
saved, the Jews would turn to Christ and be restored ac- 
cording to the Old Testament promises (Eo. 11:25 ff . ; 
Is. 59:15-21). 

(4) There would be a final death struggle on the part 
of the powers of evil led by a "lawless one," or "man of 
sin" (later called Antichrist), but the final period of strife 
was temporarily postponed by the restraining hand of the 
Eoman government (II Th. 2: 3-12). 3 

'Ph. 3:20 f. 

2 Ph. 4:5. This very definite expectation of the immediate coming 

of Christ seems so flatly to contradict the tone and subject- 
matter of II Th. 2 that a number of eminent scholars have 
doubted the authenticity of that letter. Be that as it may, 
certainly the main emphasis of Paul is on the imminence of the 
Advent. 
8 See Bousset, Antichrist Legend (London, 1896), p. 133; Milligan 
St, Paul's Epistles to the Thessalonians (London, 1908), ad loc. 
Whether St. Paul held this view until his death is uncertain. 



The Primitive Apostolic Faith 175 

(5) When Christ's victory had been made final and 
complete, he would return from heaven (I Th. 4: 16; II 
Th. 2:3-8; I Co. 15 : 23 f. ; Ph. 3 : 20). 

(6) Believers who had died meantime would then be 
raised; their spirits, which had been disembodied (un- 
clothed), would reanimate their bodies, now transformed 
into a spiritual form (I Th. 4: 14-16 ; II Co. 5 : 1-5 ; I Co. 
15:35-44). 

(7) Next believers who were alive would be given 
"spiritual bodies" and would be caught up into the air to 
meet the Lord (I Th. 4: 16 if. ; Ko. 8 : 23; Ph. 3 : 21; I 
Co. 15:50-53). 

(8) Then would begin an endless spiritual existence 
with the Lord (I Th. 4 : 17 ; I Co. 15 : 50), a reign of God 
(I Co. 15 : 28), in a transformed universe (Eo. 8 : 18-22), 
such as Isaiah (11: 6-9) had pictured. 1 

(9) As to the judgment, though he often refers to it 
without indication of its time (Ho. 14: 10; II Co. 5: 10; 
Eo. 2 : 16), he elsewhere speaks of the coming of Christ as 
the day of the Lord (I Th. 5 : 2, 4 ; II Th. 1 : 10), or as the 
time of judgment (II Th. 1 : 7-10 ; I Co. 1 : 8 ; 3 : 13 ; 5 : 5). 

(10) Christ is to be the judge (I Co. 4:4 f.). 

(11) The time of Christ's return is entirely uncertain, 
but is not far off (I Th. 5:1 ff . ; I Co. 7:29-31; Eo. 
13:11). 

(12) Paul solves the contradiction between the King- 
dom of God and the messianic kingdom by making the 
latter the present time of imperfection and unremitting 
strife (I Co. 15 : 24 f.), while God is to reign in a perfect 
world after the evil powers are overthrown (I Co. 15 : 50; 
5:9 f.). There is no millennium in Paul's eschatology. 2 

1 See above, pp. 55 f., 83. 

2 1 can find no evidence of development in Paul's eschatology, if 
one does not use the Pastorals (see below pp. 188 f.). It is not 
to be expected, since his letters cover only about a dozen years 
at the end of his life. For both sides of the argument, see 
Charles, Eschatology, pp. 379-405; and Kennedy, St. Paul's 
Conceptions of the Last Things (New York, 1904), pp. 24 f., 
163 f., 262-273. 



176 The Promise of His Coming 

About the time of Paul's death, in all probability, Peter 
came to Rome. While he was there, and before his mar- 
tyrdom, which may have occurred near the time of that of 
his great friend and rival, he dictated to Silvanus, Paul's 
old travelling companion, the first letter which goes under 
his name. It does not contain any considerable body of 
apocalyptic material, but its occasional allusions indicate 
practically the same standpoint, if hardly the same vivid 
expectation, that Paul maintained. God, he says, has be- 
gotten us "anew to a life of hope through the resurrection 
of Jesus Christ from the dead ... to an unscathed, 
inviolate, unfading inheritance, . . . kept in heaven 
for you, . . . till you do inherit the salvation which 
is all ready to be revealed at the last hour," to you who 
after proof of faith in manifold trials will receive "praise 
and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ." 1 
They are to "put their hope for good and all in the grace 
that is coming to them at the revelation of Jesus Christ." 2 
They are living "at the end of the ages." 3 "The end 
of all is near," 4 and the judgment is imminent. 5 Their 
sufferings are but for a little while. 6 The humble will 
in due time be exalted. 7 

Jesus has triumphed ; he is "at God's right hand — f or he 
went to heaven after angels, authorities, and powers celes- 
tial had been made subject to him." 8 They are to rejoice 
in sharing his sufferings, that they "may also rejoice and 
exult when his glory is revealed." 9 Peter is certain that, 
as a witness of the sufferings of Christ, he is also "to 
share the glory that shall be revealed." 10 and that the pas- 

*I Pt. 1:3-7, 
2 1:13. 

3 1:20. 

4 4:7. 

5 4:5f. 

6 5:10. ~ > 

7 5:6 f 

8 3:22. 

9 4:13. 

10 5:1. 



The Jvdean Crisis 177 

tors of the churches "will receive the unfading crown of 
glory, when the chief Shepherd shall make his appear- 



ance." 1 



II. The Judean Crisis 



Shortly before the time when Peter and Paul bore final 
witness to their faith, there appeared in Judea, according 
to current theories, 2 a "fly-sheet," a brief tract such as 
might have been written on a single sheet of papyrus, pre- 
dicting the end in the very near future. It was written 
by a Jew, probably a Jewish Christian, at the time when 
the crisis was ripening which resulted in the great Jewish 
war, and was occasioned by the increase of lawlessness 
and the unsettled state of affairs in the country due to 
Roman misrule and Jewish racial ambitions and apocalyp- 
tic hopes. There were many Christians who, as good 
Jews, could not believe anything would happen to Jerusa- 
lem until the end of the age. When they saw the plain 
evidences of the city's approaching downfall, they were 
convinced that the end was at hand. 

As disentangled from our earliest gospel this little apoc- 
alypse runs as follows: 

"When you hear of wars and rumors of war, do not 
be alarmed; these have to come, but it is not the end 
yet. For nation will rise against nation, and realm 
against realm; there will be earthquakes here and there, 
and famines too. All that is but the beginning of the 
trouble. 

"But whenever you see the appalling Horror standing 
where he has no right to stand (let the reader note this), 
then let those who are in Judea fly to the hills; a man 
on the housetop must not go down into the house or go 
inside to fetch anything out of his house, and a man in 
the field must not turn back to get his coat. Woe to 
women with child and to women who give suck in those 
days ! Pray it may not be winter when it comes, for those 
days will be days of misery, the like of which has never 

J 5:4. 

2 See above, p. 155 ff. 



178 The Promise of His Coming 

been from the beginning of God's creation until now — 
no and never shall be. Had not the Lord cut short 
those days, not a soul would be saved alive; but he has 
cut them short for the sake of the elect whom he has 
chosen. 

But when that misery is past, in those days, 

the sun will be darkened 

and the moon will not yield her light, 

the Stars will drop from Heaven, 

and the orbs of the heavens will be shaken, 

Then they will see the Son of man coming in the 
clouds with great power and glory. Then he will 
despatch his angels and muster the elect from the four 
winds, from the verge of earth to the verge of Heaven. 

Let the fig tree teach you a parable. As soon as its 
branches turn soft and put out leaves, you know sum- 
mer is at hand; so, whenever you see this happen, you 
may be sure He is at hand, at the very door." 1 

These few verses contain all the main features of Jewish 
eschatology : the warning signs and political disturbances, 2 
the development of wickedness to its utmost limit ("the 
appalling Horror"), 3 the increase of distress and suffer- 
ing to an unbearable extent, 4 then a great cosmic catas- 
trophe, 5 followed by the appearance of the messiah on the 
clouds. As we have already noted, 7 this whole picture 
has no affinities with Jesus' teaching on the subject ex- 
cept in its reference to the coming of the Son of man on 
the clouds. But if it does not represent the belief of 
Jesus, it does that of a very considerable portion of his 
followers during the first two generations after his death. 

x Mk. 13:7, 8, 14-20, 24-29. Nearly all those who accept the hypo- 
thesis of the "little apocalypse" agree to the inclusion of all the 
above verses except 28 and 29 ; some include 30 f . See the 
various opinions cited, Moffatt, Introduction, pp. 207 ff. 

2 See above, pp. 67 f . 

3 See above, pp. 110 ff. 
*Ihid. 

5 See above, pp. 116 f. 

6 See above, pp. 126 ff. 

7 See above, p. 156. 



The Judean Crisis 179 

They looked at history through the medium of their apoc- 
alyptic beliefs to such an extent that the whole of life was 
colored by Jewish eschatology. They ignored all in Jesus' 
teaching that did not harmonize with this one dominant 
color. Fortunately they were not aware of the incon- 
gruity and let his teaching stand alongside of their un- 
conscious additions and alterations. 

As we have already remarked, many early Christians, 
particularly those of Jewish descent, connected the end 
of the age with the fall of Jerusalem. It certainly is true 
that this great crisis marked a new era in Christian, as 
well as Jewish, history. Judean Christianity, which still 
clung to the old rites and ceremonies and the sacred as- 
sociations of the Holy City, received its death blow. Hence- 
forth there could be no uncertainty as to the value of 
Jewish sacrifices, and faith in them received a rude shock. 
The Jewish Christians were driven away from their estab- 
lished center and scattered; perhaps many lost their lives. 1 
At any rate, from this time on Jewish Christianity drops 
rapidly out of sight. But the end of the world had not 
yet come. The deliverance of the saints, both Jewish and 
Gentile, was still postponed, and Roman persecution tended 
to become more general and more severe. What then of 
the Christian hope ? 

Matthew's gospel is commonly regarded as a combina- 
tion of three main elements : a collection of Jesus' sayings, 
probably made by Matthew himself ; the Gospel of Mark ; 
and certain special sources. The Markan apocalypse was 
incorporated bodily. Although probably writing after the 
fall of Jerusalem, the editor did not palpably alter his 
source to fit the facts. He merely changed certain phrases 
and added certain sayings of Jesus which enhance the 
apocalyptic tone of the section. 

First of all, he plainly distinguished between the fall 

1 The bulk were led by an oracle to flee from the city while there 
was yet time. See Eusebius, Church History, iii 5, 3. 



180 The Promise of His Coming 

of Jerusalem and the final catastrophe, 1 thus at the very- 
beginning throwing a different atmosphere about the 
whole discourse. In Mark the disciples ask only when 
the Temple is to be destroyed and what the sign will be 
when this is about to happen. In Matthew they ask also 
what will be the sign of Christ's advent and the end of 
the age. Other occasional verses and phrases introduced 
reveal the editor's eschatological interest. The "abomina- 
tion of desolation" is made to refer apparently to the 
destruction of the Temple, 2 thus indicating that the fall 
of the city was regarded as a sign of the approaching end, 
and the apocalyptic idea of prophecy appears in the refer- 
ence to Daniel. The appearance of the "sign of the Son 
of man" in the heavens and the "mourning of all the 
tribes of the earth" are strongly apocalyptic. 3 The editor 
omitted verses of Mark 4 and added from his other sources 
material which probably in its original context had less 
brilliant apocalyptic coloring. 5 Especially noteworthy is 
the substitution for the very brief conclusion in Mark of 
very considerable additions emphasizing rather inconsist- 
ently the need for watchfulness because of the suddenness 
and unexpectedness of the advent. 6 If the signs already 
mentioned serve any purpose, the elect should have suffi- 
cient warning of the end. The account of the last judg- 
ment 7 is a fitting conclusion, which, like the introductory 
questions of the disciples, gives an apocalyptic tone to the 
whole discourse and shows that the writer, and no doubt 
also his fellow Christians, regarded the material he had 

1 24 : 3. This, perhaps, is due to the fact that the city had fallen. 

a 24:15. 

3 24:30; cp. Dan. 7:13 t; Zech. 12:10 ff.; Hab. 3:10 (LXX) ; Rev. 

18:9. See Moffatt in Expositor's Greek Testament on Rev. 1:7. 
*Mk. 13:9-12. already used in Mt. 10:17-22; Mk. 13:33-37, used in 

part in Mt. 24:42; 25:13f. 
5 Mt. 24:10-12, 14; 24:26-28=Lk. 17:23, 24,37. 
6 Mk. 13:33-37; Mt. 24:37-51=Lk. 17:26, 27, 34, 35; 12:42-46; Mt. 

25:1-30. 
7 Mt. 25:31-46. 



The Judean Crisis 181 

here collected as all bearing directly upon the end of the 
world. The delay of the second advent is explained in a 
very different fashion from Paul. The gospel must first 
be preached in the whole civilized world, then the end 
will come. 1 

It is not solely in the great discourse of chapters 24 
and 25 that the gospel exhibits a thoroughly apocalyptic 
tone. In many places the editor makes substitutions or 
additions which reveal his vivid hope. For the Markan 
parable of the seed growing naturally according to divine 
law, 2 he substitutes that of the wheat and the tares, with 
a distinctly eschatological interpretation. 3 To offset the 
non-eschatological parables of the mustard seed, leaven, 
pearl of great price, and hidden treasure, he introduces 
that of the dragnet, likewise eschatologically interpreted. 4 
In both he speaks of sending forth the angels, of the sep- 
aration of the good from the bad, of the punishment of 
the latter "in the furnace of fire," and of the rewards 
of the former "at the end of the age." It is a thoroughly 
catastrophic coming that he expects. The faithful disci- 
ples of Jesus shall enjoy their compensation for present 
sacrifices "in the new world (Greek: "rebirth"), when 
the Son of man shall sit on the throne of his glory." 5 
He twice substitutes the second advent of the Son of man 
for less distinctive phrases. 6 We are justified, therefore, 
in believing that this gospel reflects a heightened expecta- 
tion among the Christians in the decade just following 
the destruction of the Jewish capital. A punishment of 
the murderers of Jesus so signal and so terrible must 
be among the beginnings of travail that precede the rebirth 
of the world. 



1 Mt. 24:14. 

a Mk. 4:26-29. 

8 Mt. 13:24-30; 36-43. 

4 Mt. 13:47-50. 

B Mt. 19:28. 

e Mt. 16:28 for Mk. 9:1: Mt. 19:28 for Lk. 22:30. 



182 The Promise of His Coming 

The Gospel of Matthew exhibits a peculiar combination 
of discrete elements. The use of the phrase "kingdom 
of heaven" instead of "kingdom of God" suggests to the 
modern mind the realm of spirits, not an earthly messi- 
anic reign. But no such connotation was presented to 
the early Christian. "Heaven" was simply a reverential 
paraphrase for "God." Matthew, in contrast to Luke, 
defines the coming of the kingdom as doing God's will 
on earth. 1 Yet he has no idea of social and religious 
evolution. He is intensely nationalistic, yet distinctly 
universalistic ; he reverences the Jewish Law, yet is bit- 
terly anti-Pharisaic. He expects the kingdom to come in 
the near future, yet the believers are to go out to make 
disciples of all nations. No gospel so clearly reports 
Jesus' emphasis on the inwardness of religion and moral- 
ity, yet none makes more of an external, catastrophic 
coming of the new age. The writer shows the qualities 
of a vigorous but unphilosophical mind that catches and 
holds many truths without relating them. Therefore he 
develops and makes explicit the contradiction between the 
prophetic and the apocalyptic point of view which the 
warmth of Jesus' experience and the clarity of his thinking 
had partially fused into unity. 

III. The Domitianic Cbisis 

Two decades after the fall of Jerusalem, there broke 
over the rapidly growing Christian brotherhood a storm 
as terrifying as that which had visited the Jews. The 
cumulating grudge of the heathen public and the growing 
suspicion of the imperial government, incited by the pecu- 
liar moral inflexibility, social exclusiveness, and religious 
intolerance of the Christians, found their expression in the 
persecution authorized by Domitian, lasting from 93 A. D. 
till his death in 96. It appeared that the fires of perse- 

^n the Lord's Prayer, Mt. 6:10=:Lk. 11:2. 



The Domitianic Crisis 183 

cution would destroy the church. The trial seemed be- 
yond its strength. The end of the age, the appearance of 
Christ, and the salvation of the saints, so long promised, 
had not come. God seemed to have forgotten them. At 
this juncture a Jewish Christian, who was perfectly fa- 
miliar with the apocalyptic literature of his race and fully 
persuaded that the woes and distresses of the time por- 
tended the speedy realization of the Christian hope, wrote 
the Book of Kevelation, the New Testament apocalypse 
par excellence, clothing his faith in the rugged pictorial 
language of mythology and apocalypticism. 

In spite of all its bewildering wealth of imagery, it 
will be perfectly clear to any one who reads the Jewish 
apocalypses and the Christian apocalypse together that we 
have here a thoroughgoing attempt to adapt the whole 
apocalyptic scheme, including both form and content, to 
Christian uses. The writer believes himself to be living 
in the last times. Though the Christian church is under- 
going terrible persecution and sufferings, there is still 
worse ahead, and he writes to picture to his fellow be- 
lievers the glorious deliverance that shall come when the 
climax is reached and Christ returns to set up on earth 
his thousand-year reign. Thereafter, for a brief period, 
the powers of evil will again be unloosed, but after the 
final triumph of the Christ the new heavens and new 
earth will appear, and the eternal reign of God wiR be 
inaugurated. It is a thoroughly Jewish piece of work. 
Every detail of it can be matched in heathen mythology 
or Jewish apocalyptic, except that the messiah is "Jesus 
Christ, the faithful witness, the firstborn from the dead 
. . . who loves us, and has loosed us from our - sins by 
shedding his blood — he has made us a realm of priests 
for his God and Father," 1 and the members of the kingdom 
are the new Israel, the Christian church, "the people who 
have come out of the great Distress, who washed their 

^ev. 1:5. 



184 The Promise of His Coming 

robes and made them white in the blood of the Lamb." 1 
The Book of Kevelation makes a distinct contribution 
to the definition of eschatology. There are numerous 
details which may always be obscure to us because we are 
not familiar with their antecedents. In a number of 
points, however, his conceptions of eschatological doctrine 
are clear. The Eoman Empire is no longer the beneficent 
power which restrains the forces of evil while the gospel 
is being preached. On the contrary, personified in Nero, 
it is the Antichrist, who, like Christ, is to have a second 
advent. Thus culminates the change of Christian political 
sentiment, which, no doubt, began with Paul's death and 
the !S T eronic persecution. Four contradictory elements in 
Jewish eschatology, the reign of the messiah and the 
reign of God, the earthly kingdom and the heavenly, spirit- 
ual state, are reconciled by introducing the millennium, 
with a bodily resurrection and a reign of the glorified 
Christ, to precede the eternal reign of God in a new, 
spiritual heaven and earth. This double scheme made it 
possible to use Ezekiel's idea of the final assault of all 
the nations led by Gog 2 and their complete overthrow. It 
makes it necessary for him to introduce two judgments 
and two resurrections also. 3 But by these various means 
he has succeeded in superficially reconciling many of the 
contradictory views of Jewish eschatology. That has noth- 
ing to do with the very real service he has rendered the 
world in putting into most vivid pictures the unalterable 
faith of the Christian church that God will care for his 
own, that wickedness will be suitably punished, that Christ 
will eventually triumph, and that the spiritual powers of 
the universe, the forces for good, will come to their own 
in a world where God is recognized as supreme. 

x Rev. 7:14. 

2 He misreads Gog of the land of Magog into two entities, Gog and 

Magog; cp. Ez. 38-39 and Rev. 20:7-10. 

3 Rev. 20:4, 11, 5, 12. 



The Second Generation 185 

IV. The Second Generation 

In the Book of Revelation the apocalyptic motif in the 
New Testament culminates in a grand final fanfare. It is 
entirely possible that its writer was John the son of Zebe- 
dee, and consequently that in this book we have in fact 
as in spirit pure Jewish Christianity of the first gen- 
eration, trying still to express its marvelous faith in the 
cramped categories of Jewish eschatology. In the re- 
maining books of the New Testament which accept the 
apocalyptic program, it is no longer a living hope, but 
only a doctrine, useful for hortatory purposes, but in 
no case entering deeply into men's souls and really stir- 
ring their imaginations and their faith. The promise 
had been too often reiterated, and too often had the ex- 
pected deliverance been postponed. There were, no doubt, 
many whose thoughts are represented in the ancient word, 
coming perhaps from the Jewish Apocalypse of Eldad and 
Modad, and quoted by Clement of Rome in his letter to the 
Corinthians : 

"Wretched are the double-minded, which doubt in 
their souls and say, These things we did hear in the 
days of our fathers also, and behold we have grown 
old, and none of these things hath befallen us. Ye fools, 
compare yourselves unto a tree; take a vine. First it 
sheddeth its leaves, then a shoot cometh, then a leaf, then 
a flower, and after these a sour berry, then a full ripe 
grape/' 

Clement adds, 

"Ye see that in a little time the fruit of the tree at- 
taineth unto mellowness. Of a truth quickly and sud- 
denly shall His will be accomplished, the Scripture also 
bearing witness to it, saying: He shall come quickly and 
shall not tarry; and the Lord shall come suddenly into 
His temple, even the Holy One, whom ye expect/' 1 

*I Clem. 23:3-5; cp. II Clem. 11.2-4; translation from Lightfoot, 
Apostolic Fathers, ed. Harmer (London, 1907), pp. 67 f. 



186 The Promise of His Coming 

Though Clement may condemn those who reject the 
Christian hope, he does not again refer to it, and goes on 
in the chapter cited only to argue in a very mild and 
academic fashion for faith in the resurrection. In fact, 
there is nothing apocalyptic about the whole lengthy let- 
ter except these two quotations and one is justified in 
doubting whether the writer meant them in the original 
sense. When he wrote, shortly before the Domitianic 
persecution, and again when that trial had passed, the 
majority of Christians either dismissed the thought of 
the second coming as a doctrine to be accepted without 
criticism, or definitely opposed it. 

Under the circumstances just sketched, we are not sur- 
prised that the motto of the second generation of Christian 
believers, those who had survived the death of Peter, Paul, 
and the other original leaders, and the fall of Jerusalem, 
and had not yet faced the Domitianic persecution, seems 
to have been "Yet a little while." We find the phrase in 

1 Peter. 1 It receives unusual emphasis in Hebrews, writ- 
ten probably in Alexandria shortly before Clement's letter 
just quoted. 2 The epistle was written by one who is 
certain that tremendous changes are impending, but those 
whom he addressed were in danger of falling away from 
the faith through hope too long deferred. 3 Therefore 
he exhorts his readers, 

"Let us hold the hope we avow without wavering (for 
we can rely on him who gave us the Promise) ; let us 
consider how to stir up one another to love and good 
deeds — not ceasing to meet together, as is the habit of 
some, but admonishing one another, all the more so, 
as you see the Day is coming near/' 4 

"Now do not drop that confidence of yours; it car- 
ries with it a rich hope of reward. Steady patience is 
what you need, so that after doing the will of God you 

^rlO, "a little while." 

2 See Moffatt, Introduction, pp. 451 ff. 

3 3:12-14. 
* 10:23 f. 



The Second Generation 187 

may get what you have been promised. For in a little, 
a very little now, 

The Coming One will arrive without delay. 
Meantime my just man shall live on by his faith; 
if he shrinks back, my soul takes no delight in 
him." 1 

"Then (at Sinai) his voice shook the earth, but now 
the assurance is, once again I will make Heaven as 
well as earth to quake. That phrase, once again, de- 
notes the removal of what is shaken (as no more than 
created), to leave only what stands unshaken. There- 
fore let us render thanks that we get an unshaken 
realm ; and in this way let us worship God acceptably — 
but with godly fear and awe, for our God is indeed a 
consuming fire." 2 

But he not only threatens with judgment. Christ is 
"the high-priest of the bliss that is to be." 3 

"Once for all, at the end of the world, he has appeared 
with his self-sacrifice to abolish sin . . . and will ap- 
pear again, not to deal with sin, but for the saving of 
those who look out for him." 4 

"There is a Sabbath-Eest, then, reserved still for the 
People of God," 5 an "unshaken realm," which shall be 
theirs after the present transitory earth has been done 
away. 

The same attempt to keep alive a faith that struggled 
with disappointment meets us in the diatribe that is com- 
monly called the Epistle of James, another product of 
fin de siecle Christianity. The writer is much more con- 
cerned with the present ethical problems of his people 
than with the coming judgment. He has no doubt that 
the righteous will be rewarded with the crown of life. 6 

1 10:35-38. 

2 12:26-29, quoting Hag. 2:6; Dt. 4:24; 9:3; Is. 33:14. 
•9:11. 

4 9:26 ff. 

5 4:9. 

•1:12. 



188 The Promise of His Coming 

The apocalyptic class-consciousness is much in evidence/ 
and the woes pronounced upon the rich are in the best 
style of the prophetic denunciations. 2 But the writer does 
not betray any vivid expectation of the end in the near 
future. Even the exhortation against presumptuous plan- 
ning for the morrow is not based on the imminence of the 
second advent, but the shortness of life. 3 The coming of 
the Lord is "at hand/' yet one must not be unduly ex- 
pectant. 

"Be patient, then, brothers, till the arrival of the 
Lord. See how the farmer waits for the precious crop 
of the land, biding his time patiently till he gets the 
autumn and the spring rains; 4 have patience yourselves, 
strengthen your hearts, for the arrival of the Lord is 
at hand. Do not murmur against one another, brothers, 
lest you are judged; look, the Judge is standing at the 
very door!" 5 

Such an exhortation emphasizes the want of earnest 
expectation. 

If the so-called pastoral epistles, I Timothy, II Tim- 
othy, and Titus, are really Paul's, 6 they show a complete 
change in his attitude. None of his hopefulness and 
ardent expectation appear. The times are evil and des- 
tined to become worse — a recrudescence of apocalyptic 
pessimism. 7 Sometime Christ Jesus "will judge the liv- 
ing and the dead." His appearance and his reign are 
to be feared. 8 The righteous will be rewarded, the faith- 
less punished. 



1 2:1-8. 

a 5:l-6. 

8 4:13-16. 

4 Cp. I Clem. 23:4, quoted above p. 185. 

6 5:7-9. 

8 See Moffatt, Introduction, pp. 395-420, Peake, Critical Introduction 

to the NT {New York, 1912), pp. 60-71. 
7 1 Ti. 4:1; II Ti. 3:1-3; 4:3. See above, p. 125. 
8 IITi. 4:1. 



The Second Generation 189 

"If we have died with him, we shall live with him ; 
if we endure, then we shall reign with him; 
if we disown him, then he shall disown us." 1 

Meantime they must be zealous of good works, "awaiting 
the blessed hope of the appearance of the Glory of the 
great God and of our Savior Christ Jesus," 2 "which will 
be brought about in due time." 3 One of the strongest 
arguments against the authenticity of these letters in 
their present form is the inconsistency of their apocalyptic 
views and attitude with that of the other letters ascribed 
to Paul. They probably represent the spirit of Chris- 
tianity near the end of the first century. 

Jude and its much later expansion, Second Peter, ex- 
hibit the character of Christian apocalyptic in the second 
century. 4 Jude has directly quoted the Testament of 
Moses and the Apocalypse of Enoch. 5 He quotes also the 
pessimistic reference of I Ti. 4 : 1 to the last times. 6 But 
there is no expectation of an immediate end of all things. 
Second Peter goes even farther in detailing his doctrine 
of the end. 

"You know that mockers will come with their mock- 
eries in the last days, men who go by their own passions, 
asking, Where is His promised advent? Since the day 
our fathers fell asleep, things remain exactly as they 
were from the beginning of creation." 7 

Such may be sure that, as once the world was destroyed 

by a deluge, so again it will be by fire. 

"Beloved, you must not ignore this one fact, that 
with the Lord a single day is like a thousand years, 
and a thousand years are like a single day. The Lord is 

1 II Ti. 2:11 f. 

2 Ti. 2:13. 

3 1 Ti. 6:15. 

* Jude probably dates early in the century, II Peter very much, later ; 

see MofTatt, Introduction, pp. 355 ff., 367 ff. 
B Jude 6, 14, 15=1 En. 12:4; 60:8; 1:9; on Jude 9 see Assumption 

of Moses in Charles, Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha, II 412. 
6 Jude 18. 
7 3:3, 4. 



190 The Promise of His Coming 

not slow with what he promises, according to certain 
people's idea of slowness; no, he is long suffering for 
your sake, he does not wish any to perish but all to be- 
take themselves to repentance. The day of the Lord will 
come like a thief, when the heavens will vanish with 
crackling roar, the stars will be set ablaze and melt, the 
earth and all its works will disappear. Now as all things 
are thus to be dissolved, what holy and pious men ought 
you to be in your behavior, you who expect and hasten 
the advent of the Day of God, which dissolves the heavens 
in fire and makes the stars blaze and melt! It is new 
heavens and a new earth that we expect, as He prom- 
ised, and in them dwells righteousness." 1 

Thus will come the "eternal realm of our Lord and savior 
Jesus Christ." 2 

Here is a very definite doctrine of the end of the world 
(following the Stoic theory of a final conflagration), of 
the judgment of the wicked, and of the reward of the 
righteous in a transformed universe, but, be it noted, no 
emphasis on Christ's relationship to it all. In this, as in 
his academic argument, the writer of Second Peter shows 
how far he is from the vivid hope of Paul and his contem- 
poraries of the first generation. 

Several of the early Christian writings which just 
failed to get into the New Testament canon, such as espe- 
cially Hermas, throw light on the apocalyptic faith of the 
Christians of the early second century. 3 We shall take 
space for but one of them, the so-called "Didache," or 
"Teaching of the Twelve Apostles/' one of the earliest 
manuals of Christian doctrine and ritual. It concludes 
with a "little apocalypse" that in conciseness rivals that of 
Mark. I quote it entire. 

"For in the last days the false prophets and corrupters 
shall be multiplied, and the sheep shall be turned into 

3 3:8-13. 
■1:11. 

3 See Case, The Millenial Hope (Chicago, 1918), pp. 156 ff., for a 
brief survey. 



The Second Generation 191 

wolves, and love shall be turned into hate. For as law- 
lessness increaseth, they shall hate one another and shall 
persecute and betray. And then the world-deceiver shall 
appear as a son of God; and shall work signs and won- 
ders, and the earth shall be delivered into his hands; 
and he shall do unholy things, which have never been 
since the world began. Then all created mankind shall 
come to the fire of testing, and many shall be offended 
and perish; but they that endure in their faith shall be 
saved by the Curse Himself. And then shall the signs 
of the truth appear; first a sign of a rift in the heaven, 
then a sign of a voice of a trumpet, and thirdly a resur- 
rection of the dead; yet not of all, but as it was said: 
The Lord shall come and all His saints with Him. Then 
Shall the world see the Lord coming upon the clouds of 
heaven/' 1 

Here we have the increase of wickedness, the Antichrist, 
certain last signs, and finally the second coming. Evi- 
dently the doctrine is firmly fixed in Christian theology, 
but it does not play an active part in the writer's think- 
ing, as the remainder of the little book shows. This book 
may be taken as typical of the attitude of a large part 
of the church from the second generation down to modern 
times. In the two subsequent chapters we turn to the 
later developments of Christian thinking on the subject. 

1 16:3-8, Lightfoot's translation, The Apostolic Fathers, ed. by J. R. 
Harmer (London, 1907), p. 235. 



CHAPTEE VIII 
THEEE MILLENNIUMS OF WAITING 
I. The Millennium of Biblical History 

FOR three thousand years men have been waiting for 
the millennium. The development of apocalyptic think- 
ing during the first thousand years, the millennium of bi- 
blical history, has been sketched in the previous chapters. 
Since before the time of the prophets, nine hundred or a 
thousand years prior to Jesus' birth, the Hebrew ancestors 
of the Christian faith had looked for the appearance of 
God as their savior. We have followed the development 
of this hope down to the second century of the Christian 
era. We have discovered at the beginning a popular pre- 
prophetic faith based upon current mythology and na- 
tionalistic theology. The earlier prophets tried to rein- 
terpret the popular idea of the day of Yahweh and trans- 
form it from a selfish patriotic hope into a vital motive 
for social ethics and spiritual religion. The postexilic 
prophets and apocalyptists, while maintaining the ethical 
note and in some regards extending the spiritual implica- 
tions of what now came to be called the judgment, or the 
consummation of the age, nevertheless to some extent lost 
the vital social and historical content of the prophetic 
conception and returned to the standpoint of preprophetic 
popular religion. They developed also definite schemes 
or programs of the events of the future and a peculiar 
type of literature marked by characteristic forms and 
figures of speech. 

New Testament eschatology developed out of this Jew- 

192 



Millennium of Biblical History 193 

ish apocalypticism. Three points must be remembered 
regarding the relation of New Testament religion to this 
problem. First, Christianity was much more than an 
apocalyptic movement. Its founder Jesus, and its pro- 
tagonist Paul re-established the social ideals of the proph- 
ets in the forefront of religious thought, and though they 
consciously attempted no synthesis of social ethics and 
apocalyptic enthusiasm, yet Christian confidence that in 
some sense the new age was already here or was dawning 
led to the incorporation into practical life of the highest 
ideals of human brotherhood and divine indwelling. Thus 
Christianity consciously and explicitly revived the best 
elements of social and spiritual religion as the prophets 
had proclaimed it. But this it did because it was a revolt 
against Pharisaic orthodoxy. Therefore, Christianity was, 
in the second place, thoroughly heterodox and enthusiastic, 
the true child of Jewish apocalypticism, completely im- 
bued with faith in a speedy turn of affairs whicli should 
usher in a new age. Its hopes were not political, as 
with many Jews; in this it resembled Pharisaism. The 
language which Jesus himself used, according to the earli- 
est records in the three gospels, was understood by nearly 
all to mean that he expected soon to return in supernat- 
ural power to judge all men, and to inaugurate a reign 
of righteousness. 

In the third place, our survey demonstrates that the 
doctrine of the last things in the New Testament is any- 
thing but uniform or even consistent. Not to mention the 
books which are non-apocalyptic, to which we shall turn 
in the next chapter, we have found a surprising variety 
of views and a still greater diversity of interest and en- 
thusiasm. In the earliest Palestinian Christianity and 
in Paul, in fact in all the Christians of the first genera- 
tion, we find the liveliest hopes of the speedy return of 
Christ in power and glory to inaugurate the new age, the 
reign of God. This expectation is greatly enhanced about 
the time of the Jewish war and the fall of Jerusalem. 



194 The Promise of His Coming 

It begins to ebb again in the two decades that follow, but 
blazes up once more at the time of the Domitianic perse- 
cution, this time in the full paraphernalia of Jewish apoca- 
lyptic, with a wealth of imagination and a systematic 
inclusiveness not hitherto met in Christian circles. There- 
after it ceases to be a living hope, at least in the minds 
of most Christians, and, except as again and again cir- 
cumstances similar to those which gave it birth call it 
back to life, it becomes a dead doctrine, a part of the 
faith once delivered to the saints. 

The New Testament Apocalypse exercised a decisive 
influence on subsequent Christian thinking. In the New 
Testament, aside from the Revelation, there is unlimited 
apocalyptic enthusiasm but no millennarianism. There is 
the vivid expectation of the return of Christ to reign, 
but there is no distinction between his rule and the king- 
dom of God, which, according to the gospels, he came 
to found. Wherever the Book of Revelation was accepted, 
its more systematic eschatology became church doctrine, 
unless it was interpreted allegorically, as it was by the 
great Alexandrian divines, and eventually by Augustine. 
Where it was rejected, there was usually no millenarian- 
ism, or chiliasm, and usually no emphasis upon Christ's 
return. In the East, the Montanists in the second century 
made the doctrine one of the cardinal points of their return 
to the primitive faith, while, by way of reaction against 
their unbridled enthusiasm, the greater part of the eastern 
church long refused the Revelation a place in the canon. 1 

II. The MiLiLENABiAN System 

There is no space here to follow the development of 
eschatological thinking down to the modern millenarian 
systems. In general one may say that the doctrines of 
the second coming and the millennium have run like 

1 See Case, The Millennial Hope, pp. 156-184. 



The Millenarian System 195 

underground streams through all the history of Christian- 
ity. When occasion arose, especially during persecutions 
and unusual political disturbances, great famines or pes- 
tilences or catastrophes in nature, they would come to the 
surface and for a time become a mighty river. When 
the circumstances that called them forth changed, the 
people, disappointed in their hopes, abandoned the doc- 
trines as errors, until a new generation arose that had 
forgotten. So it was just before the year one thousand, 
in this case partly because of unsettled conditions, partly 
because of Augustine's doctrine that the millennium had 
begun with Jesus' advent and would last a thousand 
years, when the second advent and the judgment would 
come. We see other flood-tides of apocalypticism in the 
Apostolic Brethren and the Spirituals of the twelfth and 
thirteenth centuries, in the Taborites of the fifteenth, in 
the Zwickau Prophets and the Anabaptists of the Refor- 
mation, the Fifth Monarchy Men and some of the Quakers 
of the seventeenth century in England, a little later the 
Camisards and the "French Prophets," the Darbyites, the 
Irvingites, the Millerites, and the Mormons of the early 
nineteenth century, the French Catholic prophetism of 
the time of the Franco-Prussian War, and the great in- 
terest which the subject has excited since the recent war 
began. 

Ever since the Reformation a special inciting cause 
has been at work, the study and literal interpretation of 
the Bible. The greater the emphasis laid on the written 
word as the authoritative norm of Christian belief because 
the verbally inspired message of God to man, the stronger 
the tendency to accept the program of the Book of Revela- 
tion with sundry supplements from Daniel and other 
apocalyptic sections of the Bible. This is perhaps the 
main cause of the interest taken by the German pietists, 
the Shakers, the modern Adventists, beginning with Wil- 
liam Miller, and the Premillennialists of today in Eng- 
land and America. 



196 The Promise of His Coming 

In the apocalyptic program, both Jewish and Christian, 
there are certain matters on which there has been wide 
disagreement. Is there to be a millennial reign of God 
on earth, and, if so, on what sort of an earth, the present 
earth, or one transformed and regenerated? How is the 
new age to be brought in, by human or divine agency? 
What part is the messiah to play, and is he the son of 
David, the son of Levi, or a supernatural being? These 
are questions which the Jewish apocalyptists answered 
variously according to their historical surroundings and 
their spiritual outlook. Only the question regarding the 
messiah received a definite answer in Christian dogma. 
As to the resurrection, heaven, hell and future punish- 
ment, an intermediate state, the part of angels, devils, 
Satan, and Antichrist in the final drama, there was great 
uncertainty in all quarters. Babylonian, Persian, Egyp- 
tian, and Greek mythology and superstition, working in 
part indirectly through Judaism and in part directly 
through converts, are responsible for many details of 
Christian belief on these points. As Christian theologians 
have gone to work on the confused eschatological doctrines 
of the Old and New Testaments, there has necessarily 
resulted an even greater diversity of views in modern 
than in ancient times. 

On certain questions, however, the apocalyptic faith has 
never been in doubt. The world is growing worse, and 
the end of the age, or of the world, is to be preceded by 
a falling away into heretofore unparalleled sinfulness, 
by woeful catastrophes, and by terrifying portents which 
will indubitably indicate the coming of the crisis. When 
wickedness has reached a frightfulness which the divine 
long-suffering cannot endure, God will interpose to judge 
and punish the wicked and to reward the righteous, who 
shall enjoy unbounded felicity under a new regime which 
will be just the opposite of the present world order. Suc- 
cessive generations of apocalyptists have read in the evils 
of their own times the signs of the end and have tried 



Objections to Premittermialism 197 

to console themselves and their fellow believers with the 
assurance that now the time is ripe; that God must im- 
mediately intervene and, by the destruction of all evil, 
usher in the promised new age in which dwelleth right- 
eousness. 

In the Christian church the Adventist sects and the 
Premillennialists within the so-called orthodox denomina- 
tions, while differing greatly on points of detail, gener- 
ally add to the apocalyptic scheme a gathering, or restora- 
tion, of the Jews, the physical return of Christ from 
heaven, a more or less physically and materially under- 
stood resurrection, and a more or less grossly conceived 
millennium on earth. They all agree that the gospel 
must be preached in the whole world, but that only a 
few will be saved, and human society will but grow 
worse and worse until the end of this present dispensa- 
tion. 

III. Objections to Premilleistntalism 

One would not for a moment claim that the origin 
of an idea surely determines its value. But the origin 
and history of this doctrine plainly brand it as false 
and misleading. It arose largely from heathen mythology. 
It was the faith of Jewish nationalism in the time of the 
prophets. They tried to reform it, but it remained the 
stronghold of those who in the Bible are called false 
prophets. Revived by Ezekiel and gradually purified by 
him and his successors, its extravagant promises and false 
ideals caused the rejection of Jesus and his message and 
were at the bottom of the great Jewish revolts of A. D. 70 
and 135. Taken over substantially unchanged into Chris- 
tianity as one of its foundation stones, it eventually be- 
came a millstone about the neck of the church that would 
have drowned the new movement, if other doctrines and 
interpretations had not counterbalanced its influence. 

The premillennialist faces other difficulties. Not the 
least of them is that history, of which he makes so much, 



198 The Promise of His Coming 

has repeatedly falsified, not merely his particular pre- 
dictions, but his whole conception of God and the world. 
As we have seen, the preprophetic Hebrew who longed 
for the day of the Lord was mistaken. As the prophets 
warned him, his hopes were all vain; God did not inter- 
vene as he expected to restore the glories of the Jewish 
kingdom. All through Jewish history, from Ezekiel 
through Zachariah, Haggai, and all the non-canonical Jew- 
ish apocalypses to the time of Bar-Cochba, the promise 
of God's miraculous intervention was again and again 
held out to encourage the people, but their hopes were 
never realized. The early Christians looked for the speedy 
appearing of their Master on the clouds of heaven to put 
an end to their sufferings and persecutions. 

"For in a little, a very little now, 

The Coming One will arrive without delay." 1 

And the premillennialist asks us to believe that the "little 
while" may be stretched to eighteen hundred years, or 
twenty-four hundred, if we take the date of Habbukuk, 
who first penned the words. He still insists that now 
at last the end is near, just as all his forbears have always 
declared. An apocalyptic writer who did not believe that 
the end was near is inconceivable. All these centuries the 
world has been growing worse, or rather it has always 
been just on the verge of reaching the extreme point 
of sinfulness. A doctrine that thus repeatedly has been 
discredited must be revised, not by the simple expedient 
of changing the date a few years, but by some thorough- 
going alteration in its principles. 

The fundamental difficulty with premillennial views is 
that they depend upon the dogma of verbal inspiration and 
the accompanying method of literal interpretation. Any 
scheme of literal interpretation must of course entirely 
ignore all that is inconsistent with it. It must also treat 
all parts of the Bible as equal. Daniel and Kevelation 

^Ieb. 10:37; Hab. 2:3. 



Objections to Premillennialism 199 

are put on a par with Isaiah and the Fourth Gospel. The 
ethical and spiritual progress made by Judaism and Chris- 
tianity is ignored, and we are asked to live by a doctrine 
the main elements of which were borrowed from heathen 
mythology. Jesus is to be supplemented and interpreted 
by Revelation instead of the opposite. 

Premillennialism involves an external and literalistic 
interpretation of prophecy. Every prediction must come 
to pass exactly as written. Some have already been ful- 
filled in part, all must be in the course of time, if the 
Scripture is the word of God. Thus prophecy is made 
a matter of prediction, not of teaching the truth; a fore- 
telling, not a forth-telling; and the prime value of the 
great prophets as God's messengers of righteousness is 
obscured. Instead of a mine of truth, the Bible becomes 
a quarry from which to hew prognostications of a shape 
and size to fit the current theory of the future. One 
need not stop to point out the moral and spiritual loss 
of such a conception of the Word. 

The philosophical basis of such a belief is the ancient 
dualism which represents matter as essentially evil. Sal- 
vation from evil and sin can come, therefore, only by the 
destruction or complete transformation of the material 
world. 1 The doctrines of the catastrophic end of the pres- 
ent world order and the visible return of Christ reveal a 
most naive, unphilosophical view of the universe and the 
soul, and an utterly materialistic and mechanical concep- 
tion of morals and religion. When one objects to such 
doctrines, one is held to deny the power of God. One 
might answer that their proponents deny the good sense 
of God. Why should he make a world that demanded 
such a procedure? Can one possibly believe that he has 
done so? Rather, does not all we see in the universe 
tend to establish a faith far higher than that of the 

1 Windelband, History of Philosophy (translated by Tufts, New 
York, 1914), pp. 230 f. 



200 The Promise of His Coming 

ancient apocalyptist with his crude notions of a Ptolemaic 
universe ? 

Premillennialism transfers the weight of interest from 
this world to the next. Attention is focused on saving 
one's soul from this present evil age and keeping it un- 
spotted until the new age appears. The nerve of active 
Christian endeavor is in danger of being slowly paralyzed. 
Fortunately many Premillennialists, especially within the 
so-called orthodox churches, are not consistent, and, de- 
spite their views on this subject, are so thoroughly imbued 
with the spirit of their Master that they cannot refrain 
from social and missionary endeavor. But that is not 
true of some Adventist groups, the majority of whom are 
proselyters rather than missionaries or evangelists. If the 
world is steadily growing worse and this present social 
order is soon to be destroyed, while, as many Adventists 
teach, God will give all men a chance in the new age, 
why should one wear out his life trying to preach to in- 
different hearers ? Such a doctrine of God and the world 
will in most cases smother the activity that might be 
aroused by the saying, "This gospel of the Reign shall be 
preached all over the wide world as a testimony to all 
the Gentiles, and then the end will come." 1 Thus scien- 
tifically, philosophically, historically, spiritually, and 
practically Premillennialism is discredited. 

IV. Other Theories 

Formally Premillennialism finds its antithesis in Post- 
millennialism. Practically it does not always work out 
so, for the latter term may be used to cover as great a 
variety of beliefs as the former. In itself the term signi- 
fies only the belief that the second advent is to come 
after, not before, the millennium. Such a faith involves 

*Mt. 24:14. The real character of Adventism is revealed by the 
paltry conception of evangelization held by many of its fol- 
lowers. 



Other Theories 201 

an entirely different world view from that of the Pre- 
millennialist, for it implies that the forces now at work 
in the world, spiritual or natural, as you please — for the 
Christian the terms are synonymous — are to bring in the 
reign of God, and that the appearance of Jesus Christ in 
glory will be the climax of the gradual growth of the 
kingdom of God. Such a view we will in a few moments 
expound more fully, and the term Postmillennialism might 
be used to cover what I believe to be the true view, 
/were it not for the fact that it has too often been used to 
( include a faith in the visible, physical return of Christ 
at the end of the millennium and a "spectacular" judg- 
ment on the lines of the parable of the sheep and the 
goats literally interpreted, a faith that is utterly at vari- 
ance with science and spiritual religion. 

For many Christians one hindrance to a proper inter- 
pretation and appreciation of apocalyptic is this belief in 
a bodily resurrection and a "spectacular" judgment, a 
view held by Premillennialists and many Postmillennial- 
ists. A study of the origin of the idea of the bodily 
resurrection, which we cannot here enter upon, would prove 
helpful. 1 It must suffice to call attention to the absurdity 
of supposing that Jesus' physical body went to a heaven 
somewhere above the clouds. Which way was Mount Oli- 
vet pointing at that particular moment ? God is a spirit ; 
Jesus and all other beings in his presence must also be 
spirits. We can believe that spirit can recognize and 
communicate with spirit. In a sense we can see him with 
the eyes of the spirit now; some day with clearer vision 
we shall see, no longer in a glass darkened by fleshly 
limitations, but face to face. The idea that the ascended 
Christ must assume physical form to rule as God's vice- 
gerent on earth is merely a relic of the old Jewish ma- 
terialistic hope of a Davidic kingdom re-established on 
earth. As spirit he went to heaven. As spirit he will 

1 See above, pp. 128 ff. 



202 The Promise of His Coming 

return. That this earth will sometimle no longer support 
human life is one of the prognostications of science, as well 
as of mythologies innumerable and of the Bible. Whether 
that end will come by heat or cold no one can say. But 
for spiritual religion that far-off event can -have no con- 
nection with a calling of disembodied spirits back into 
physical bodies and the summoning of the quick and the 
dead before a throne set up somewhere in the physical 
universe. Judgment is inevitable, but the literal, spec- 
tacular sort must be relegated to the limbo of supersti- 
tions along with the hell of fire and brimstone. 

Disgusted with the vagaries of Premillennialism and all 
literalistic views, many Christians have cut the Gordian 
knot by denying the eschatological teachings of the New 
Testament any historical, social, or cosmic significance. 
The reiterated exhortation to be ready, for we know not 
the day nor the hour when the Son of man cometh, all 
that one reads regarding watchfulness, is supposed to 
apply only to the death of the individual. Any one who 
has heard "revival" preaching is familiar with the use 
of these texts in sermons that consist mainly of anecdotes 
of sudden death. A recent scholarly writer, Wilhelm 
Bousset, one of the foremost German students in the 
realm of ideas, seems to find in Jesus' preaching of the 
coming kingdom nothing of present value except the prom- 
ise of an existence with God in the "unknown Whither" 
to which all of us must soon pass. 1 ISTot but that this is a 
legitimate and most solemnizing thought. But what a 
paltry use to make of a doctrine that is absolutely universal 
in its implications ! The wider relationships of the prob- 
lem revealed to us by anthropology, comparative myth- 
ology, and the study of social movements demand a more 
careful evaluation of the doctrine. Three millenniums 
of waiting cannot be thus summarily dismissed. 

1 In his Jesus (Eng. trans. New York, 1906), pp. 97 f. 



CHAPTER IX 
THE SECOND ADVENT 

I. The Modern Christian's Dilemma 

NO belief of Christianity filled so large a share in 
the horizon of the early Christians as that in the 
Second Advent/' says one of the foremost of English classi- 
cal scholars. 1 Practically every well known student of the 
New Testament would agree with him. It is difficult for 
us in this age to conceive the power and vividness of this 
early Christian hope. It colored the thinking of the first 
disciples, as the idea of evolution does that of the modern 
scientist, or the hope of social amelioration that of the 
modern socialist or Bolshevik. As we have seen, with 
one notable exception, every writer in the New Testa- 
ment seems fully to expect that Jesus will return on the 
clouds of heaven with power and great glory. Large 
sections of the earliest gospels dwell on the thought- 
Paul refers to it in practically every letter. Later writers 
are almost impatient in urging patience upon those who 
are beginning to be weary of waiting. One of the watch- 
words of the Christian brotherhood consisted of the Ara- 
maic words, Marana tha, "0 Lord, come!" 2 The Book 
of Revelation closes with the words, "He who bears this 
testimony says, 'Even so : I am coming very soon.' Amen, 
Lord Jesus, come !" How incongruous it seems that this 
fundamental doctrine of the first Christians, though nom- 

1 Percy Gardner, Exploratio Evangelica, 2nd ed. (London, 1907), 

p. 277. 
2 1 Co. 16:22; Didache 10:6. 

203 



204 The Promise of His Coming 

inally accepted, is practically neglected by the greater 
portion of modern believers and "would be scarcely missed 
if it were removed from the scheme of Christian be- 
lief!" 1 

The whims and freaks of ancient apocalypticism and 
modern adventism during three thousand years of wait- 
ing have driven the great majority of Christians into 
complete indifference to the whole subject. A vast num- 
ber of clergymen and laymen say, when it is mentioned, 
that it has never interested them. They pass over the 
references of Jesus and Paul or explain them away by 
some of the half-way methods we have mentioned in the 
previous chapter. They find the Revelation so difficult and 
uncongenial that they have given up trying to understand 
it. A few of the striking and inspiring phrases and 
pictures of the Christian Apocalypse, dislocated from the 
context, their doctrinal implications forgotten, are an in- 
dispensable part of Christian thinking and feeling. What 
would the preacher do without the "great multitude, which 
no man can number," "the great white throne," "the holy 
city, the new Jerusalem," "the river of the water of life," 
and "the tree of life" ? What would Christian song be 
without its "Hallelujah, the Lord God omnipotent reign- 
eth" % Even these expressions are coming to be less and 
less used because they have less and less real meaning. 
For that large number who accept the main tenets of 
apocalypticism in some indefinite fashion it has no vital, 
practical value. The Adventist who makes this funda- 
mental doctrine of primitive Christianity a powerful mo- 
tive in living may come much nearer the mind of his 
Master than many a modern believer who disdains the 
unintelligence and one-sidedness that so often marks apoca- 
lypticism. 

To one with a consistent view of the universe and 
human history such as a thorough common school educa- 

1 Gardner, op. cit., p. 2S6. 



Modern Christians Dilemma 205 

tion and sound common sense give, the premillennial con- 
ception of the future is absurd. As a friend remarked 
to me, "The premillennial question has no interest for one 
with the modern point of view." It is outside the world 
of his thinking. Are we, then, simply to discard the 
doctrine of the second advent as we do that of a flat 
earth with a hemispherical "firmament" above it? Are 
all the hopes that have been distilled into the prayer, "Thy 
kingdom come," to be fulfilled only in heaven and never 
on earth ? Are we just to "muddle along" as best we can 
century after century and millennium after millennium, 
pulling ourselves up by our bootstraps ? 

Can we be Christians and dismiss as an unimportant 
fantasy, or perhaps a rather troublesome overemphasis 
of fanaticism and scholarly erudition, a belief that was 
the very center of Jesus' thinking and which alone gave 
point to his death and a foundation for the primitive 
church? That it did play so important a role, which 
we have sufficiently proved, must lead us to pause and 
consider its intrinsic value for us. If it were found to 
have none, loyalty to the intellectual and religious sin- 
cerity of Jesus would compel us to regard pious allegori- 
cal and figurative rehabilitations as we would an Egyp- 
tian mummy dressed in cap and gown. We cannot con- 
tinue to maintain a doctrine because it was once useful, 
as we do the buttons on our sleeves. But if we must 
discard this one, we shall be perilously near discarding 
Jesus. What can we do with this troublesome but in- 
sistent doctrine? 

It is to be expected that, after so many disappointments, 
there should be many like the double-minded of Clement's 
letter to say, "These things we did hear in the days of 
our fathers also, and behold we have grown old, and none 
of these things hath happened," 1 or like the scoffers of 
Second Peter's time to say, "Where is His promised ad- 
vent ? Since the day our fathers fell asleep, things remain 
1 See above, p. 185. 



206 The Promise of His Coming 

exactly as they were from the beginning of creation." 1 
Not "mockers . . . who go by their own passions," 
but sincere, earnest followers of the Master from that 
day to this have been asking the question. Often with 
breaking hearts they have prayed the prayer, "Amen, 
Lord Jesus, come I" And we today, after years of devasta- 
ting war, as winters of famine and summers of pestilence 
fall on central Europe and western Asia, as social unrest 
and industrial disturbances multiply, we, too, just as 
earnestly and seriously, are asking the question, "What 
does his promised coming mean to us in the twentieth 
century?" 

The answer to this question is of interest not merely 
because it played so large a part in the faith of primitive 
Christianity and in the teaching of Jesus himself. Nor 
is it of importance merely because so many earnest and 
sincere Christians have been misled by its extravagances 
and made barren and unfruitful. It has a much wider 
significance. Our question is the Christian formulation 
of a longing that seems as old and as widespread as the 
human race. Those primitive myths of world cycles end- 
ing with an all-embracing cataclysm and the return of the 
Golden Age indicate how deeply seated in the human heart 
is the hope that evil shall be eventually punished and 
destroyed and man live in purity and happiness. 2 The 
restless, untiring efforts of man to subdue the earth and 
make it a fitter place in which to live, social complaints, 
ideals, and endeavors, from Ipuwer and the Eloquent 
Peasant of Egypt nearly two thousand years before 
Christ, 3 through communism, socialism, and the labor 
movement to the I. W. W. and Bolsheviki, all testify 
that man must strive forward to something better. Has 
Jesus any offer of real help? Does his coming promise 

1 II Pt. 3:4. 

2 See ERE, art. "Eschatology." 

3 See Breasted, Religion and Thought in Ancient Egypt, pp. 199-256; 

cp. above, pp. 7 f . 



Social-Spiritual Interpretation 207 

any fulfilment of all these hopes and aspirations? If 
it does, this doctrine will call forth a response from one 
of the most deep-seated and powerful of human instincts. 
What does "the promise of his coming" mean to the 
human race? 

The fundamental strength of the premillennial position 
is twofold: it promises a better world without effort on 
man's part, and superficially and historically it seems to 
be the position of Jesus. Postmillennialism is too aca- 
demic to satisfy the wistful longings of the human heart 
and it cannot meet the premillennial argument from Scrip- 
ture, for it is equally superficial. Indifference, allegor- 
ical interpretation, indeed, every method that has been 
used to avoid the premillennial conclusion fails on the 
one side or the other. Social Christianity promises a 
better world, but it seems to neglect the Bible, for a 
great number of biblical writers were apocalyptists, and the 
lurid colors of their faith tinge the more delicate, spirit- 
ual tints of the others. Any one who accepts the Bible 
in its apparent "plain meaning" as his final authority is 
quite certain to be either a Premillennialist or an Ad- 
ventist. Since, now, both these theories are absolutely 
discredited by the facts of history and science, the only 
alternative would seem to be to discard the Bible. For- 
tunately there is "a more excellent way." The Bible itself 
gives us the outlines of a very clear interpretation of 
another kind, an interpretation that takes account of 
the fundamental truths of the apocalyptic view and also 
the modern view of God and the world. 

II. A Social-Spiritual Interpretation 

From the records it seems clear that Jesus used the lan- 
guage and ideas of apocalypticism. But he was too broad 
and well balanced in his thinking to be exclusively dom- 
inated by any one idea. From the prophetic literature 
and social experience of his race and from his own com- 



208 The Promise of His Coming 

munion with the Father he had imbibed certain concep- 
tions of human and superhuman relationships that were 
universal in their applications and, therefore, far tran- 
scended in permanent value the form, at least, of the 
apocalyptic doctrine. Jesus' social teachings, interpreted 
not as moral rules of thumb but as ethical principles, 
have proved themselves the final word of practical effi- 
ciency in solving social problems wherever they have been 
tried. Jesus' conceptions of the fatherhood of God, the 
value of sacrificial service, and the inwardness of religion 
are the only solvents of ecclesiasticism and formalism in 
worship, of interclass and international suspicions and 
jealousies, and of all the miseries and perplexities of the 
human heart, and they provide a sufficient method and 
dynamic for realizing Christian social-ethical ideals. Was 
Jesus conscious that these ideas were fundamentally in- 
consistent with the apocalypticism he had inherited from 
his Jewish environment? That we cannot say. Consist- 
ency of language and thinking is the mark of small souls. 
At any rate, we must seek an interpretation of the ultimate 
meaning of his apocalypticism in the light of his social 
and spiritual outlook, and this positively forbids our mak- 
ing his conception of the coming kingdom any less social 
or less spiritual than his own life and teachings. We find 
that social and spiritual interpretation in the Fourth Gos- 
pel, in Paul, and in Luke. 

Toward the end of the second generation of Christians, 
that is, near the beginning of the second century, the 
"Beloved Disciple" came to a mature realization of many 
truths which had been hidden from his fellow believers. 
In the Fourth Gospel we reach the highest point in the 
ISTew Testament, an interpretation of the inner meaning 
of Jesus' person and teaching that rises sun-crowned 
above all the lesser peaks of New Testament literature. 1 

1 1 am not here referring to its historical, but its religious value. 
Who the "Beloved Disciple" was does not matter for our present 
purpose. 



Social-Spiritual Interpretation 209 

". . . Much that at the first, in deed and word, 

Lay simply and sufficiently exposed, 

Had grown (or else my soul was grown to match, 

Fed through such years, familiar with such light, 

Guarded and guided still to see and speak) 

Of new significance and fresh result; 

What first were guessed as points, I now knew stars, 

And named them in the Gospel I have writ. 

For men said, 'It is getting long ago: 

Where is the promise of his coming V — asked 

These young ones in their strength, as loth to wait, 

Of me who, when their sires were born, was old. 

I, for I loved them, answered, joyfully." 

The quality of this Johannine answer is thrown into 
brilliant relief by contrast with that of II Peter. The 
latter knows no honest doubters, only mockers, and he 
answers by threatening them with the mythological dogma 
of a world conflagration. The Johannine answer comes 
from a heart that has been in communion with the spirit 
of God. It does not threaten punishment, but promises 
power. It is a joyful answer, to be apprehended by the 
faith that overcomes the world. 

Few chapters in the New Testament have caused the 
Christian heart more difficulties than the thirteenth of 
Mark and the twenty-fourth and twenty-fifth of Matthew. 
If you will turn to the Gospel of John you will find that 
to all intents and purposes the fourteenth, fifteenth, and 
sixteenth chapters take the place in the gospel outline 
of these troublesome chapters — and probably no part of 
the New Testament has brought more comfort to the 
Christian heart that these three chapters of the Fourth 
Gospel. 1 It is admitted, I believe, by scholars of every 
"tendency," that the Fourth Gospel was written to cor- 
rect certain misunderstandings and to supplement cer- 
tain lacks in the other three. It 



1 On the Johannine interpretation of apocalypticism see E. F. Scott, 
The Fourth Gospel, its Purpose and Theology (Edinburgh, 
1906), pp. 295-319; Case, The Millennial Hope, pp. 136-141. 



210 The Promise of His Coming 

". . . patient stated much of the Lord's life 
Forgotten or misdelivered^ and let it work." 

When once John 14, 15 and 16 are read in place of Mark 
13, a flood of light is thrown on the difficulties we have 
been studying. The very phrase quoted in Hebrews, the 
motto of the apocalyptists of the second generation, 1 is 
happily echoed and reinterpreted. Jesus is coming again, 
in a little while, not on the clouds, but in the hearts of 
believers. 

"I will not leave you forlorn ; I am coming to you. A 
little while longer and the world will see me no more; 
but you will see me because I am living and you will be 
living too. ... If anyone loves me he will obey my 
word, and my Father will love him, and we will come to 
him and take up our abode with him. . . . Yet — I 
am telling you the truth — my going is for your good. 
If I do not depart, the Helper will not come to you; 
whereas if I go, I will send him to you. ... In a 
little while, you will behold me no longer; then, after a 
little, you shall see me. . . . Just now you are in 
sorrow, but I shall see you again and your heart will 
rejoice — with a joy that no one can take form you." 2 

Only the spiritual Christ who is always to be present 
in the world can say, "Remain in me, as I remain in 
you." 3 Just as in Ro. 8 Paul speaks of the Spirit of 
God, the Spirit of Christ, and Christ as one and the 
same, so in the Fourth Gospel the Comforter, the Spirit 
of truth, and Christ Himself are one. To the Christian 
of 110 A. D. who read the Gospel of John, Christ had 
already come in the Holy Spirit, the Helper, the Com- 
forter. He needed no longer to wait "a little while." 
The promised advent had taken place. He could well 
have sung, 

1 See above, pp. 186 f. 

2 John 14:18 f., 23; 16:7, 16, 22. 

3 John 15:4. 



Social- Spiritual Interpretation 211 



cc 



I ask no dream, no prophet-ecstasies, 
KTo sudden rending of the veil of clay, 
No angel-visitant, no opening skies; 
But take the dimness of my soul away." 

Although occasionally the customary Synoptic language 
of the judgment and the last day creeps into John's 
mind, he is equally clear in substituting a spiritual judg- 
ment for the spectacular one usually deduced from the 
twenty-fifth chapter of Matthew. 

"God did not send his Son into the world to pass sen- 
tence on it, but to save the world by him. He who be- 
lieves in him is not sentenced; he who will not believe 
is sentenced already, for having refused to believe in the 
name of the only Son of God. And this is the sentence 
of condemnation, that the Light has entered the world 
and yet men have preferred darkness to light. . . . 
Now is this world to be judged; now the Prince of this 
world will be expelled. . . . The Prince of this world 
has been judged." 1 

The divine judgment is not external, but internal; it is 
not technical, but moral; it is not forensic, but natural; 
it is not future, but present. 

This interpretation of the judgment is only possibly 
because of a new, spiritual interpretation of the messianic 
victory over the powers of evil. In Jesus' death he had 
cast out the Prince of this world and drawn all men away 
from their former allegiance to evil and transferred it to 
himself. "Unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth 
and dies, it remains a single grain; but if it dies, it 
bears rich fruit." 2 

According to the Fourth Gospel the disciple shall indeed 
suffer persecution. 

"Remember what I told you, 'A servant is not greater 
than his master/ 



*3:17 ff.; 12:31; 16:11. 
2 John 12:24. 



212 The Promise of His Coming 

If they persecuted me, they will persecute you; 
if they hold to my word, they will hold to yours. 



They will excommunicate you ; indeed the time is com- 
ing when anyone who kills you will imagine he is per- 
forming a service to God. . . . Truly, truly, I tell 
you, you will be wailing and lamenting while the world 
is rejoicing; you will be sorrowful, but then your sorrow 
will be changed into joy. ... In the world you have 
trouble, but courage ! I have conquered the world." 1 

Here is no picture of progressive deterioration. Here is no 
moral or spiritual pessimism. Jesus' very death means 
the overthrow of Satan and all his hosts. For it makes 
possible the coming of the Helper, the Spirit of truth, 
who will guide the disciple into all truth and convict 
the world of sin, of righteousness, and of judgment. So 
far from the world growing worse, "he who believes in 
me will do the very deeds that I do, and still greater 
deeds than these . . . Ask whatever you like and 
you shall have it. . . . It is I who have chosen you, 
appointing you to go and bear fruit — fruit that lasts." 2 
Here no limits are set to the power of God. The victory 
has been won by the death and resurrection of Christ, as 
by a tremendous preliminary fire of artillery. It only 
remains for the church to move forward to clear out the 
already fleeing enemy and possess and "consolidate" the 
positions which the hostile forces evacuate as it advances. 
Christ could say, "My kingdom is not of this world," 
else "would my servants fight." Fighting, the enforcement 
of law, any external force can never bring in the kingdom 
of God. Christ's kingdom is not of this world because 
it is to be brought in, not by physical or material means, 
but by spiritual forces working in and through the hearts 
of men. Yet it is in the world. The disciples are not to 

1 15:20; 16:2, 20, 33. 
s 14:12; 15:7, 16. 



Social- Spiritual Interpretation 213 

be taken out of the world but to be saved from its evil. 1 
This is a most practical doctrine. It is clear that it is 
but a consistent development of the Pauline idea of the 
victorious life in Christ, made possible by a faith that 
bears the fruits of the Spirit, the social fruits of "love, 
joy, peace, good temper, kindliness, generosity, fidelity, 
gentleness, self-control." 2 Paul says, "The victory is 
ours, thank God! He maketh it ours by our Lord Jesus 
Christ. . . . For he must reign until all his foes are 
put under his feet." 3 It is equally clear that both Paul 
and John have their footing squarely on the teaching of 
their Master and ours, who taught his disciples to pray, 
"Thy kingdom come," which, being interpreted, means, 
"Thy will be done," not in heaven, but "on earth as it is 
in heaven." By the seal of his approval Jesus immor- 
talized the spirit and message of the Old Testament proph- 
et who said, 

"Wash you, make you clean ; put away the evil of your 
doings from before mine eyes ; cease to do evil ; learn to 
do well; seek justice, relieve the oppressed, judge the 
fatherless, plead for the widow. . . . If ye be will- 
ing and obedient, ye shall eat the good of the land." 4 

Paul's living and thinking explicitly and that of the 
Fourth Evangelist implicitly center around the ideal of 
Jesus, heart religion bearing fruit in social righteousness. 
The Gentile physician Luke more than any other New 
Testament writer interprets for us this social ideal of 
Jesus. He knew and could report sympathetically the 
apocalyptic spirit of the first Christians. His historical 
sense was too fine for him to omit such primitive traits. 
His philosophical training was not sufficient for him to 
be aware of the essential inconsistency of his own posi- 
tion. But his sense of social need and his faith that 

•17:15. 

2 Gal. 5:23. 

8 1 Co. 15:57, 25. 

*Is. 1:16-19. 



214 The Promise of His Coming 

the gospel of Jesus could meet that need were so over- 
powering that he collected and added to his story of 
Jesus just those elements which have made his work 
par excellence the "social gospel." 

In his version of the Markan apocalypse Luke goes far 
beyond Matthew in distinguishing the fall of Jerusalem 
from the end of the world. The latter he puts off into 
the far distant future, "till the period of the Gentiles 
expires/' 1 thus showing that he had no hope of an im- 
mediate advent. He makes the most of the social dis- 
satisfaction that expressed itself in apocalyptic literature, 
for example, in the idea of the overthrow of the mighty 
and the exaltation of the poor, found in the songs of 
his first chapter. His version of the Beatitudes show3 
emphatically where his sympathies are. The inaugural 
address at Nazareth breathes the same atmosphere. More- 
over, the messianic victory is already won, Satan has 
fallen as lightning from heaven. Accordingly the king- 
dom is here, 2 the new age when the weak and down- 
trodden get their rights has already begun. 3 Thus plainly 
Luke breathes the atmosphere of the prophets, reporting 
the eschatological hopes of early Christianity without 
sharing them and reproducing its apocalyptic atmosphere 
without being touched by its fanaticism. Paul with his 
tense messianic expectation, but equally vivid sense of 
the social and spiritual values of the gospel, Luke with 
the latter fully maintained, but the former paling, and 
the Fourth Gospel with the eschatological emphasis evanes- 
cent, but the practical and mystical filling the picture, 
are three stages in the progressive approach of Chris- 
tianity to the essential faith of its founder. 4 

1 21:24. 

2 17:21. 

3 10: 17-24. 

4 Unfortunately in the Fourth Gospel the mystical displaces the 

social, and for the latter emphasis we must turn to Paul and his 

"beloved physician." 



Premillennialism Conserved 215 

III. The Values of Premillennialism Conserved in 
the Social-Spiritual View 

Since there is so much in apocalypticism, ancient and 
modern, that is weak and even puerile, why has an over- 
ruling providence allowed it such a prominent place in 
the writings of our faith, or, to put it differently, how 
does it come that through all the centuries it has kept 
such a strong grip on some of the best and most sincere 
saints, first of Judaism and then of Christianity? The 
answer is plain and must be spoken with all emphasis: 
Because there is so much in it that satisfies the deepest 
needs of the human heart. And that is another way of 
saying that it contains certain great fundamental truths. 
The weaknesses to which we have called attention 1 are 
the rough outside burr that hides the rich kernel within. 
It is man's lot to see "the baffling reflections in a mirror," 
not to look directly upon the glory of truth. Why does 
God allow us to go on groping for the truth instead of 
clearly revealing it to us ? Why did he suffer the Hebrews 
to go on century after century with the priesthood and 
sacrifices and ritual of the Old Testament? The ready 
answer, only partially satisfactory, is, because the fulness 
of the time had not yet come, the world was not yet 
ready for Jesus. Why has he suffered the greater part 
of the world to go on to this day without that life-giving 
evangel ? We cannot answer fully such questions, but the 
solutions lie somewhere in the same region. Our eyes 
do not like the glaring white and black of an overexposed 
photograph. Our minds are not capable of grasping 
truth cleanly and squarely and completely separating it 
from the false. Except in such little matters as two and 
two make four, falsehood is always mixed with our truth. 
The Old Testament religion was imperfect and inadequate, 
but the Law was a pedagogue to lead men to Christ, 
1 See above, pp. 194-200. 



216 The Promise of His Coming 

Non-Christian religions are imperfect and inadequate, 
but they so meet the needs as to nourish the religious life 
and keep it alive till a better gospel comes. So Pre- 
millennialism has kept alive vital truths. 

"I say that man was made to grow, not stop; 
That help, he needed once, and needs no more, 
Having grown but an inch by, is withdrawn : 
For he hath new needs, and new helps to these. 
This imports solely, man should mount on each 
New height in view ; the help whereby he mounts, 
The ladder-rung his foot has left, may fall, 
Since all things suffer change save God the Truth. 
Man apprehends him newly at each stage 
Whereat earth's ladder drops, its service done. 



I say, that as the babe, you feed awhile, 
Becomes a boy and fit to feed himself, 
So, minds at first must be spoon-fed with truth : 
When they can eat, babe's nurture is withdrawn/' 

What then are the values which apocalypticism has 
preserved ? A recent writer has characterized the thought 
of Jesus with regard to the future as "transmuted escha- 
tology. 1 We need today a transmuted apocalypticism. 
The vital hopefulness, the inspiring enthusiasm, the feel- 
ing of tension that made great undertakings possible, all 
these qualities in the early church, which were due largely 
to its expectation of the speedy return of Christ in power, 
we need today. 

We need the driving power of Premillennialism. The 
comparatively small group of Premillennialists in the 
orthodox and Adventist churches is probably as vigorous 
and zealous as any corresponding number of their op- 
ponents. It may be objected that their zeal is not ac- 
cording to knowledge, and in fact that it seems to require 
a sort of fanaticism in one's make-up to prepare him to 
swallow the manifest absurdities of parts of the premil- 

1 See above, p. 149. 



Premillennialism Conserved 217 

lennial scheme. It is possibly true that the same extreme 
temper that opens his mind to his peculiar doctrine makes 
him zealous both as a propagandist and as a Christian. 
At the same time the fact must not be overlooked, nor 
by any partisanship obscured, that the premillennial view 
has contributed tremendously to Christian energy and ac- 
tivity along its chosen lines. Particularly is it to be 
noted that Premillennialism is the doctrine of many 
outstanding evangelists, such as "Billy" Sunday, J. Wil- 
bur Chapman, E. A. Torrey, D. W. Potter, L. W. Mun- 
hall, A. J. Gordon and Dwight L. Moody. 1 Postmillen- 
nialism entirely lacks this driving power. Its very title 
suggests the postponement of Christ's coming and of any 
accounting until some far-off epoch. The name and the 
doctrine as well should, therefore, be abandoned, not only 
for scientific, but also for practical reasons. It lays em- 
phasis on the negative side of the doctrine of Christ's 
coming, and, accordingly, falls far below the positive 
doctrine preached by the Premillennialist. 

We need the tension of apocalypticism. The arrow 
will fly to its mark only if the bow is strung. The violin 
will speak only if the strings be drawn to the right ten- 
sion. The steel that protects the homes and the rights 
of democracy must be properly tempered. The army that 
wins must have an immutable esprit de corps, an indom- 
itable morale. The victorious attack must be made under 
the stimulus of high excitement. Every man should "live 
continually in the presence of the best, with ready re- 
sponse," to use a favorite phrase of President Henry 
Churchill King. The great man is one who works nor- 

1 See above, p. 142. The Premillennialist rightly claims to walk in 
most excellent company, with Luther, Melanchthon, Milton, 
Burnett, Isaac Newton, Watts, Charles Wesley, Toplady, and 
a host of others. See W. E. B. ( Blaekstone ) , Jesus Is Coming 
(3rd rev.), p. 41. W. E. B. fails completely in discussing 
"Work," op. cit., p. 119. Evangelism in the sense of winning 
the individual, not social evangelism or social service, is the 
kind of work to which the Premillennialist chiefly gives himself. 



218 The Promise of His Coming 

nially under high tension. 1 Great deeds are normally 
performed under abnormal conditions. Occasional relaxa- 
tion is necessary, but most men break under the strain 
of minor worries, a strain that would be removed if the 
soul were centered on some great task, if it were lost 
in a great enthusiasm. This the early Christians had 
because of the apocalyptic faith. A sense of the im- 
minence of tremendous changes, the belief that all things 
should not go on as they had from the foundation of the 
world, the consciousness of living in the immediate pres- 
ence of another world, the momentary expectation of the 
coming of the Master on the clouds to judge and trans- 
form the present world order, a worldwide vision, sub 
specie aeternitatis, all this lifted the early Christians out 
of themselves and made them capable of efforts and 
endurance that without such inspiration would have been 
completely impossible. It made different men of them. 
Galilean peasants, Syrian peddlers, and Greek slaves be- 
came the heralds of a new age, the leaders of a new 
social movement, largely because they felt themselves to 
be living at the end of the age ; under such extraordinary 
conditions they must lead extraordinary lives. 

"Now as all things are thus to be dissolved, what holy 
and pious men ought you to be in your behavior, you who 
expect and hasten the advent of the Day of God, which 
dissolves the heavens in fire and makes the stars blaze 
and melt." 2 

Granted the practical efficiency, the "driving power" 
of the apocalyptic faith, it becomes necessary to seek for 
the fundamental motives which it uses. What are the 
great truths underneath the surface which have made it 
appeal so powerfully to some of the greatest Christian 
leaders in ancient and modern times? In what does its 

1 See the interesting discussion of Jesus' greatness by G. Stanley 
Hall, Jesus, the Christ, in the Light of Psychology ( New York, 
1917), II 432 ff. 

3 II Pt, 3:11 f. 



Premillennialism Conserved 219 

"driving power" lie, and how may it be conserved in a 
saner view of divine providence ? 

The social-spiritual view eliminates the objectionable 
features of apocalypticism, its pessimism, its determinism, 
its externalism, and its literalism. It preserves the valu- 
able elements, often in a form which enhances their appeal 
and power. For a coming of the messiah on the clouds 
at the end of the age it puts a present and continual 
coming of the eternal, personal, yet imminent Christ in 
the hearts of believers and the institutions of society. 
For the final "great assize" it puts a present judgment. 
For an eventual vindication of righteousness from with- 
out the world and man it puts a gradual and progressive 
victory of the right due to its own inherent power. It 
retains all the social dissatisfaction and wistful longing 
for a better era that marked ancient apocalypticism, but 
it looks for social regeneration through the operation of 
the spiritual forces which God has implanted and directs 
within the individual and society. The social-spiritual 
view does not undervalue the apocalyptic expectation of 
catastrophic judgment, but reads its great truth into a 
saner view of social evolution. From the mountain top of 
its high experience with God it reads his presence and 
his reign in a thousand signs of the times. Its inter- 
pretation of social and spiritual relationships puts the 
soul in the presence of the highest and most powerful 
motives and ideals of service. The values of the apoca- 
lyptic, or premillennial, w T orldview which the social-spirit- 
ual faith and hope conserve require but a brief exposi- 
tion. 

In practice the Premillennialist usually, no doubt, 
makes much of communion with Christ here and now as a 
preparation for his future coming. But the necessary 
consequence of emphasis on the coming with the clouds 
is to weaken the sense of fellowship with the present 
Christ. Professor E. F. Scott states the difficulty clearly : 



220 The Promise of His Coming 

"It was not possible for Paul, as for the Fourth Evan- 
gelist, to assume a present and immediate fellowship 
between the exalted Christ and the believer. In accord- 
ance with his Apocalyptic idea of the Parousia, he con- 
ceived of the manifestation of Christ as still in the future. 
A time would come when His people would be received 
into His presence, but their communion as yet was not 
directly with Him, but with the Spirit which was in His 
stead. This idea of the Spirit as the 'earnest' of what 
will be hereafter, is in some respects the key to the whole 
doctrine as it appears in Paul. He realized that the 
Christian life was in its essence a fellowship in Christ, 
and yet, by the belief which he shared with the primitive 
'Church, he was obliged to think of this fellowship as still 
future/' 1 

This difficulty which Professor Scott points out inheres 
still more strongly in any view which differentiates be- 
tween Christ and the Spirit in an unscriptural fashion, 
as so many moderns do, but as Paul did not. 2 It is 
increased by emphasis on the physical appearance of 
Christ at the last day. Christ is gone away, he has left 
his own "orphans" until he comes again. And the "little 
while" of the promise has become two thousand years. 

If, on the contrary, we take the view that the "little 
while" was only the interval between the death and resur- 
rection, then Christ is still with us all the time. 

i 

"Where is your Lord? 
Seated at God's right hand, 
Captain of Heaven's host, 
Directing campaigns grand 
On some removed coast 
Of Eternity's vast sea — 

So far above 

Man's highest love 
He cannot reached be? 



1 Fourth Gospel, pp. 329 f . 
a Cp. Ro. 8:9-11. 



Premillennialism Conserved 221 

Where is your Lord? 
At God's right hand in sooth: 
Where'er his servants brave 
Are fighting for the truth, 
That all the world may have 
His larger life. 'Tis here 

The Christ is found: 

His accents sound 
Within your soul — so near! 

Where is your Lord? 
Within the daily round 
Of duty. God's command 
For you just now's the sound 
Of the Master's voice. Stand 
To your hard task ! Be true 

To your ideal ! 

God's will's the real — 
Your Lord dwells there for you." 

To feel that Christ is here, that he is leading the hosts 
of righteousness to ultimate victory, that "he must reign 
till he hath put all enemies under his feet" means com- 
fort for the hour of trial and strength for the hour of 
battle. It is a vital, victorious faith to believe that the 
spiritual Christ has never left the world, and that more 
and more he is being enthroned in the souls of men and 
the institutions of society. 

The practical value of the proclamation of the im- 
minence of the judgment day is obvious. One who has 
to be ready momentarily for the striking of the final bal- 
ance is likely to be careful in his accounts. One will 
be cautious in drawing his cheques if he remembers that 
all accounts are balanced daily and that overdrafts are 
never allowed. To be sure, religion that is based on fear 
is of a very low type. But the pedagogical value of fear 
is to be recognized ; we are reacting from the sentimental- 
ity that fears to mention retribution. "Whatsoever a man 
soweth, that shall he also reap," is a law written in the 



222 The Promise of His Coming 

heart of the universe. The ethical value of the vivid 
picture of the "Great Assize/' as it is drawn by Jesus, 
cannot be realized at the present time from a non-literal- 
istic interpretation mainly because of the necessity of 
guarding against the undue literalism of both Pre- and 
Post-miliennialism. 1 With the rapid spread of saner views 
of interpretation that difficulty will disappear. The power 
of the Johannine idea of present judgment to move all 
but the grossest minds cannot be denied. History, physi- 
ology, psychology, in fact every science that touches man, 
proclaims aloud the truth that the soul's verdict is now 
being written moment by moment, not by recording angels 
in heavenly books, but by each man himself on the fleshy 
tablets of his own heart, and that inevitable judgment is 
written just as ineradicably into the fiber of a nation or 
a church or a labor union as it is on the individual soul. 
For individuals and social groups alike, "now is the 
judgment of this world." For the spectacular judgment 
day we have only a few obviously rhetorical passages of 
Scripture and certain remote analogies. For the truth 
that every day is a day of judgment we have the inner 
spirit of the teachings of the prophets and Jesus and a 
thousand facts and apposite analogies all through the 
realm of nature. It is a spiritual truth, to be spiritually 
apprehended, and, therefore, all the more powerful when 
once it is written on a man's heart. Above all it is a 
vital and not a mechanical doctrine. Judgment is not 
inflicted from without, but from within. God, the wisest 
of all fathers, has so ordered the universe that some- 
how, sometime, sin brings its own punishment, with no 
accuser, no judge, no jury, to stand between the naked 
soul and its guilt. Surely the teacher, the preacher, and 

1 John Wesley's remarkable sermon on "The Great Assize" ("No. xv), 
strong as it is, is an excellent illustration of the weakness of 
a literalistic Postmillennialism. He surely could have made a 
much stronger impression and have been more consistent if he 
had urged the imminence of the day of doom. 



Premillennialism Conserved 223 

the evangelist can ask for no more practical and powerful 
doctrine. 

If Premillennialism, following the example of its pred- 
ecessors, preprophetic Hebrew and postprophetic Jewish 
apocalypticism, somewhat overdoes the idea of the tri- 
umph of God's own people, it is perfectly right in insist- 
ing on the ultimate vindication of righteousness. 

"Kepresent it to ourselves how we may, the essentially 
ethical character of Christianity demands the final victory 
for righteousness. ... At the back of the doctrine 
of the Second Advent lies the conviction that it is not 
ethical to assume that good and evil will continue for- 
ever balancing one another. A permanent dualism is 
not completely ethical. A God of Righteousness means 
that some day righteousness will prevail as a world or- 
der. And the victory must be where the battle is." 1 

This admirable statement, by an Australian student of 
eschatology, would no doubt meet the approval of most 
Adventists. The Premillennialist insists on the vindica- 
tion of righteousness, and that on this earth "where the 
battle is." But in his view that vindication is to come 
by an interference from without. God must step in and 
"scrap" this present world order, before righteousness can 
win. The rules of war must be changed in the midst 
of the conflict, so as to give righteousness the advantage. 
The second advent is the deus ex machina which accom- 
plishes the desired result. Such a hope makes it easier 
to believe in the vindication of the right, but it misses 
the point. It is not a real vindication. Our souls demand 
that right shall prevail because it is right, because God 
is in it, not because God is back of it, to help out in the 
final struggle. If the victory is to be won where the 

1 The Rev. R. G. Macintyre, B.D., professor of Systematic Theology 
in St. Andrews College (University of Sydney), "The Second 
Advent: The Fact of It/' in Expository Times XXVIII 2 (Nov., 
1916), 90. The writer in an effort to preserve the truth of the 
idea of world catastrophe, greaty confuses his case, as it seems 
to me. 



224 The Promise of His Coming 

battle is, it must be in this present world order, with 
the laws of society and of the soul just what they are 
now. A spiritual view of the coming of the kingdom de- 
mands greater faith, for, though right has been winning 
since history began, evil is a hydra-headed monster, and 
the ultimate victory is not yet in sight. We have, indeed, 
no assurance that the battle will ever cease, for every stage 
in the development of the individual and the race has its 
own difficulties, and no real flesh and blood saint ever 
escaped the clutches of temptation. We cannot even 
prove that death will mean the end of effort and achieve- 
ment. All analogies from our present life would suggest 
rather the contrary. Real existence seems to involve ef- 
fort; growth comes from exercise; life implies activity. 
If the millennium, if heaven itself means nothing more 
to do, no further advances to make, no problems to solve, 
no difficulties to overcome, no victories to win, it fades 
into a nirvana. Eighteousness is to be vindicated in tri- 
umphant conflict. Who would not pray for "strength for 
the fight," rather than to be "carried to the skies on 
flowery beds of ease" ? The moral value of such a doc- 
trine is unimpeachable. A present, progressive judgment, 
a present, progressive vindication of righteousness, these 
are doctrines to live by. 

"Thy saints in all this glorious war 
Shall conquer, though they die: 

They see the triumph from afar, 
By faith they bring it nigh." 

A present, progressive judgment of evil and vindication 
of righteousness mean a gradual but complete social re- 
generation. The social implications of apocalypticism have 
often been overlooked. It has been forgotten that, in 
its bitter protest against social wrongs, it was the true 
and only successor of prophetism. It has been assumed 
that the kingdom of heaven meant a kingdom in heaven. 
As Professor Percy Gardner has truly said, "The per- 



Premillennialism Conserved 225 

sistent belief of the Jews in a coming reign of righteous- 
ness on earth, though it had in it much of materialism, 
also contained the germs of progress." 1 A very consid- 
erable group of Christians, perhaps the majority, inherited 
this materialistic faith from the Jews. Its repeated dis- 
appointment may, as Professor Gardner suggests, have 
contributed to the otherworldliness that later characterized 
the church. But from the first there had been those who, 
like Paul and the author of IV Ezra, believed their cit- 
izenship was in heaven, and that flesh and blood could 
not inherit the kingdom of God. Even this sublimated 
messianic hope has its social implications. It grew out 
of complete dissatisfaction with the present social and 
world order. By contrast it might intensify the blackness 
of social wrongs under which men suffer during this pres- 
ent age. 

Yet the practical falsity of otherworldliness lies in the 
fact that, by its promises of future joy when life is done, 
it tends to deaden the soul's sensitiveness to present evils. 

"A tent or a cottage — 
Why should I care? 

They're building a mansion 
For me over there." 

Sufficient and wholesome food for the children of poor 
and rich alike will not be a burning issue for one whose 
eyes are fixed on 

"Jerusalem the golden, 

With milk and honey blest." 

We are right in passing back over the otherworldliness of 
the later church to the practical social ideals of Paul, 
Jesus, and the great Hebrew prophets of righteousness. 
However much Paul may have longed for the "building 
of God, the house not made with hands, eternal in the 
heavens," he seems never to have lost touch with life, 
nor to have failed to see the measures necessary to insure 

1 Exploratio Evangelica, p. 287. 



226 The Promise of His Coming 

the practice of the righteousness of the kingdom among his 
converts. The practicability of the social principles of 
Jesus cannot be too much emphasized. Jesus' kingdom 
was not of this world in its principles and methods. 
Love, not selfishness, was to rule it; it was to come 
by the power of the Spirit, not by force. But it was 
to come on the earth. The victory must be won where the 
battle is. 

This social evaluation of the advent of the Spirit leads 
to a revaluation of the historical applications of apoca- 
lypticism. According to the apocalyptic view regenera- 
tion can come only after catastrophe. The popular con- 
ception of evolution made the catastrophic seem entirely 
out of place, for it supposed that science knows only a 
gradual, almost imperceptible advance in nature and 
history. More mature study has shown that evolution 
means nothing of the kind. In nature, in the individual 
soul, and in society, to quote Mr. Streeter, 

"the greatest advances are frequently per saltum. They 
occur in epochs or moments of crisis, as in the Apocalyp- 
tic parable of 'the Day of the Lord/ The Eeformation, 
the French Eevolution, or the rebirth of the Far East in 
our own time, are conspicuous examples, but in a measure 
this is no less true of nearly all considerable movements. 
Such crises, no doubt, are the result of causes which can 
to some extent be traced, and have been prepared for by 
a slow and gradual development. But in their realiza- 
tion they are catastrophic, and take even the wisest by 
surprise.^ 1 

In the individual, development comes through the resolu- 
tion into order of the chaos due to a problematic situa- 
tion. Adolescence is particularly the period of catastro- 
phic evolution; out of its "storm and stress" there come 
reorganization and regeneration of the powers and ideals. 

1 Chapter on "The Historic Christ/ 5 in Foundations: A Statement of 
Christian Belief in Terms of Modern Thought. By Seven Oxford 
Men (London, 1913), pp. 120 f. 



Premillennialism Conserved 227 

Likewise in social groups and in the race, it requires the 
purifying fires of difficulty and disaster to prepare for 
the development of larger life. Catastrophes of earth- 
quake, fire, and flood, with all the suffering they entail, 
not infrequently bring a train of economic, social, and 
moral advances, as the San Francisco disaster wiped out 
the old Chinatown. 

Apocalypticism recognized all this in its doctrine of 
catastrophic judgment. The ancient prophets of Israel 
tried to interpret the sufferings of their nation as a 
divine chastisement for her sins. Nothing can be clearer 
than that Second Isaiah understood that the day of Yah- 
weh was past, and that, as a result, the nation could now 
hope for the glorious regeneration, the new age which had 
been so long promised by his predecessors. 1 Allowing for 
the oriental extravagance of the prophet's language, we 
cannot but regard him as the precursor of the social-spirit- 
ual view of apocalypticism. When a people seems to have 
received double for all her sins, but in some measure or 
in some part has remained faithful to the truth, then the 
wav is prepared for the coming of the Lord. 

When one watches the incoming tide, the waves seem 
often for a time to fall back and back, until one might 
suppose the highest point had been reached and the ebb 
had begun. But unexpectedly a great wave gathers the 
falling waters and hurls them far beyond any point yet 
reached. So out of defeat and despair victory is born. 
The rising tide of righteousness seems often to be receding, 
but it is not so. Out of the very break-up of the social 
fabric new forces come to light which carry us on to 
greater achievements. Whereas the apocalyptic view is 
thoroughly mechanical, this interpretation of the facts 
welds the catastrophic and the so-called normal into an 
organic universe. Instead of proclaiming that Jesus is 
coming at some definite or indefinite date in the future, 
1 See above, pp. 73 f., 89 f. 



228 The Promise of His Coming 

it cries, "The kingdom of God is at hand/' the day of the 
Lord is upon us. Quit you like men, be strong. 

Men say rightly that the twentieth century began in 
1914. However deeply one may feel that war is of the 
Devil, one cannot but admit that some wars at least have 
indirectly hastened the coming of the kingdom. Our 
Spanish War, touched off by a mean and utterly unchris- 
tian spirit of revenge, with its watchword, "Remember 
the Maine," has worked miracles, not only for the social 
and moral improvement of our island possessions, but for 
the broadening of our own national ideals of service. 
The Japanese-Russian War, along with unfortunate re- 
sults, helped marvellously in opening up the Orient to 
western influences, including Christian missions. The 
recent world war, though its destructiveness has been 
unparalleled, not only in physical, but in social and moral 
matters, is even now creating new opportunities for spread- 
ing the kingdom. The early Christians thought that the 
Jewish war and the destruction of Jerusalem involved 
the final judgment and the immediate coming of the king- 
dom of God. And so it did in a sense much truer than 
they dreamed. It revealed the inner nature of the ma- 
terialistic, mechanical type of apocalyptic hope which 
drove the Jews into revolt against Rome; it eventually 
furthered the progress of spiritual religion among both 
Jews and Christians by divorcing them from the Holy 
City and the forms of Temple worship. So, if the recent 
war reveals to the pacifists that their failure was due to 
lack of practical organization and to trust in commerce 
and the progress of civilization rather than in the higher 
spiritual motives, if it convinces the Christian world 
that it has been playing at its task instead of going up 
to possess the land, it will have worked a purifying judg- 
ment of the most far-reaching consequences and will have 
tremendously hastened the coming of the reign of God. 

"The king is dead; long live the king." One crisis 



Premillennialism Conserved 229 

is past, another is upon us. The perils of peace are 
greater than the perils of war. 

"Once to every man and nation comes the moment 

to decide, 
In the strife of Truth with Falsehood, for the good 

or evil side; 
Some great cause, God's new Messiah, offering each 

the bloom or blight, 
Parts the goats upon the left hand, and the sheep 

upon the right, 
And the choice goes by forever 'twixt that darkness 

and that light. 



Backward look across the ages and the beacon- 
moments see, 

That, like peaks of some sunk continent, jut through 
Oblivion's sea; 

Not an ear in court or market for the low foreboding 
cry 

Of those Crises, God's stern winnowers, from whose 
feet earth's chaff must fly; 

Never shows the choice momentous till the judgment 
hath passed by." 

When the armistice was signed the morale of armies 
and nations began to ebb away, and the subsiding flood 
of high enthusiasm and noble purpose has left exposed 
all the old rottenness of private greed and class selfish- 
ness and political partisanship and national narrowness. 
Unless as individuals and social groups, churches, parties, 
classes, and nations, we can meet the strain of social 
reorganization, new catastrophes impend. God's judgments 
are not reserved till some uncertain future ; they are now 
upon us. 

All the prophets, great and small, from Amos to Jesus, 
were continually crying out to men to heed the signs 
of the times. No feature of apocalypticism has been more 
misused by modern Adventism and Premillennialism. Yet 
there is tremendous truth behind it. The apocalyptist deals 



230 The Promise of His Coming 

almost exclusively in catastrophic signs of the times. Jesus 
pointed to the happy signs, the rainbow of promise. In 
his victory over the powers of evil he saw evidence that 
the kingdom was already in the world. "If I by the 
Spirit of God cast out demons, then is the kingdom of 
God come upon you." Political or physical progress that 
furthers the interests of society, the advances of medicine, 
sanitation, housing, the expansion of commerce, the con- 
quest of the earth, the sea, and the air that has made it 
possible to fulfil the command to go and disciple all na- 
tions, the overthrow of slavery, the progress of temper- 
ance, all these are signs, not that the kingdom is soon 
to come, but that it is already here. They are not the 
kingdom, for it is not meat and drink; it is a matter 
of the heart But they are the outward evidences and ex- 
pressions, the fruits of its coming. And those who make 
light of such fruits of the Spirit are in grave danger 
of denying the Spirit and the power of God. And so, 
in clouds and sunshine, we read the signs of the coming 
of the time when "the earth shall be filled with the knowl- 
edge of the glory of the Lord, as the waters cover the 



sea." 



"The summits of certain mountains are seen only at 
rare moments when, their cloud-cap rolled away, they 
stand out stark and clear. So in ordinary life ultimate 
values and eternal issues are normally obscured by minor 
duties, petty cares, and small ambitions; at the bedside 
of a dying man the cloud is often lifted. In virtue of 
the eschatological hope our Lord and His first disciples 
found themselves standing, as it were, at the bedside of 
a dying world. Thus for a whole generation the cloud 
of lesser interests was rolled away, and ultimate values 
and eternal issues stood out before them stark and clear, 
as never before or since in the history of our race." 

This excellent evaluation of early Christian apocalypti- 
cism by Mr. Streeter 1 puts at once before us one of the 

1 Foundations, pp. 119 f. 



Premillennialism Conserved 231 

strongest points in the premillennial faith. I never under- 
stood the situation of San Francisco and the cities around 
the Bay until I looked down upon them from the hills 
of Marin County. Travel, vacations, and similar relaxa- 
tions tone us up partly because they take us out of the 
routine, away from the trivial round of care, and enable 
us to see our lives in perspective, to get a sense of 
proportions. How much more does a great, soul-shaking 
experience, a great love, a great loss, a great enthusiasm, 
shatter the deadening conventions and fond falsehoods 
that have imprisoned the spirit and set it free to see life 
true and whole ! How many soldiers "found themselves" 
at the front under fire! Like any permanent passion, a 
vital belief in the imminence of the judgment and the 
second advent acts as a corrective to wrong estimates of 
present values. It continually lifts the soul out of itself 
and its small affairs and sets it on a mountain top from 
which it can see life as heaven sees it. With such a 
faith it is easier to value as they really are property and 
social ambitions and dress and the hundred little things 
that occupy the minds of most men and women. This 
releases vast resources of energy for Christian service and 
accounts in large measure for the "driving power" of 
premillennial doctrine. 

But we have noted how the premillennial mountain top 
gives only a partial and one-sided view of life. On the 
other hand, a belief in a present judgment, a faith, not 
in the imminence of a physically visible Messiah on the 
clouds, but in the immanence of a spiritual Christ com- 
ing in the hearts of men and in the relationships of so-' 
ciety, a faith in the power of God to make one victor 
in the face of apparent defeat, a faith that in the quiet 
processes of spring time and harvest and in the catastro- 
phic leaps of thunderstorm and earthquake the spiritual 
forces of the universe are slowly working out the present 
and ultimate triumph of righteousness, this sends one out 
with that sanity of outlook, that wholesomeness of hope, 



232 The Promise of His Coming 

and that tirelessness of endeavor which are slowly winning 
the world to acknowledge him who reigns. A social-spirit- 
ual apocalypticism truly sees the world sub specie aeterna- 
tatis. 

The tension of apocalypticism is more than reproduced 
by the social-spiritual view. We have every reason to 
feel the zeal of Adventism and Premillennialism, but 
< turned into social action. We have every reason to feel 
down to the bottom of our hearts that "now is the ac- 
ceptable time, now is the day of salvation." Indeed we 
have tenfold more reason for tensity of interest and effort 
than the man who holds the apocalyptic faith. The arch- 
angel's trumpet that Paul expected would strike all ears 
whether they listened or not. Trumpets all around us 
are proclaiming the presence of the Lord, and we hear 
them not; his signs are flaming in our skies, but we see 
them not; for our ears are dull and our eyes are heavy. 
"If thou hadst known in this day, even thou, the things 
that belong unto peace ! but now they are hid from thine 
eyes." Is not this generation "eating and drinking and 
marrying and giving in marriage," unaware that the days 
of the Son of man are upon it? We are forever vainly 
repeating, "Thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth 
as it is in heaven." Only as we give every ounce of our 
strength to fulfilling our prayers can we really pray. 

If we feel to the depths of our hearts that the Master 
has come, that he is in our world, leading the fight for 
the kingdom, and that we have to give the last drop of 
blood to win the objective he has placed before us, that 
this is the day of the Lord for our generation, can we 
not work under a frictionless tension that will enable 
us to realize the fulness of our capabilities? The Pre- 
millennialist feels the urgency of winning souls. We 
have every reason to feel it, for the night cometh when 
no man can work, and a still greater enthusiasm should 
fire the heart of him who recognizes his obligation to try 
to save men, not only for their own sake, but also for 



Premillennialism Conserved 233 

the sake of society, for the fellowship of the kingdom. The 
tension that comes from the sense of great tasks should 
be supplemented by that of great expectations. There 
is not only 

". . . one far-off divine event, 
To "Which the whole creation moves." 

Divine events, miraculous transformations, are happening 
all around us. He that cometh is coming, and he does not 
tarry. The present tense is the language of faith. 
I come back to the question with which we began : 

'Watchman, tell us of the night, 
What its signs of promise are. 

Traveler, o'er yon mountain's height 
See the glory-beaming star!" 

We acknowledge the crudities of the visions of the ancient 
prophets and apocalyptists of Israel, but let us not despise 
their faith. 

"New occasions teach new duties ; Time makes ancient 
good uncouth." 
We cannot 

". . . attempt the Future's portal with the Past's 
blood-rusted key." 

But, profiting by the mistakes and successes of the past 
we can make a new key for our future. And from the 
experience of the past we can learn that the one key that 
will open the world to us is faith in a living Christ. We 
have not lost God out of our world. Science finds spiritual 
forces imponderable, but it can not deny their reality. 
History and nature are not less under Providence because 
they are under law. The reign of law is the reign of God. 
As we come to know it better the natural is not less super- 
natural. A sane historical interpretation of the basic ele- 
ments of apocalypticism leaves us but confirmed in our 
faith that God reigns ; our hope that every knee shall bow 
and every tongue confess him Lord; and our passion to 



234 The Promise of His Coming 

serve until all the ends of the earth shall see the salvation 
of our God. 

"Loud mockers in the roaring street 

Say : Christ is crucified again, 
Twice pierced His gospel-bearing feet, 
Twice broken His great heart in vain 

I hear and to myself I smile, 

For Christ talks with me all the while. 

No angel now to roll the stone 
From off his unawaking sleep, 

In vain shall Mary watch alone, 
In vain the soldiers vigil keep. 

Yet while they deem my Lord is dead 
My eyes are on his shining head. 

'No more unto the stubborn heart, 
With gentle knocking shall he plead, 

No more the mystic pity start, 

For Christ twice dead is dead indeed V 

So in the street I hear men say 
Yet Christ is with me all the day." 1 



L .Richard Le Gallienne. 



CHRONOLIGICAL TABLE 

c. — circa (about); p. — post (after). 

c. 1200 Exodus 

xi. cent. Song of Deborah 

c. 1050-937 United Kingdom 

937-721 Divided Kingdom 

x-viii. cent. Earliest histories, J and E 

782-738 Uzziah, king of Judah 

781-740 Jeroboam II, king of Israel 

c. 745 Amos 

c. 740 Hosea 

738-p. 700 Isaiah 

c. 725-700 Mieah 

722-1 Fall of Samaria 

c. 650 Deuteronomy (in the main) 

c. 627 Zephaniah 

627-580 Jeremiah 

c. 610 Nahum 

c. 600 Haibakkuk 

597 First Captivity 

592-586 Ezekiel 1-32 (in the main) 

586 Fall of Jerusalem; second Captivity 

586-570 Ezekiel 33-48 (in the main) 

p. 586 Lamentations: Obadiah; Jeremiah 30-33 (?) 

549 Beginning of Cyrus' conquests 

Isaiah 13-14; Jeremiah 50-51 
538 Cyrus in Babylon 

First return of Exiles 

Isaiah 40-55 
521 Insurrections in Persian Empire; suicide of 

Cambyses 
520 Temple begun at Jerusalem 

Haggai; Zechariah 1-8; messianic hopes 
aroused 

235 



236 


The Promise of His Coming 


516 


Temple completed; Empire reorganized 




Isaiah 56-66 




Malachi 


458 


Return of Ezra 


445 


Return of Nehemiah; walls of Jerusalem re- 




built 


444 


Law, as in Pentateuch, accepted; beginning 




of canon 


400 


Anabasis 




Joel 




Chronicles : Ezra-lSTehemiah 




Jonah; Ruth 


332 


Alexander; beginning of Greek period 




Isaiah 24-27 ( ? See below) 




Zechariah 9-14 ( ? See below) 


320-198 


Ptolemies and Seleucids struggle to control 




Palestine 




Job; Ecclesiastes 




Close of prophetic canon 


198 


Antiochus III conquers Palestine 


c. 180 


Jesus, son of Sirach 


176 


Antiochus IV Epiphanes 


170 


Temple plundered 


168 


Temple desecrated; Maccabean revolt 




Book of Noah; I Enoch 6-36 (Before 166) 


c. 166 


I Enoch 83-90 


165 


Temple rededicated 




Daniel; Isaiah 33 


161 


Death of Judas 


161-143 


Jonathan 




Zechariah 12-14 ( ?) 


143-135 


Simon 




Sibylline Oracles III (in the main) (before 




140) 


135-105 


John Hyrcanus I 




Isaiah 24-27 ( ?) ; 34-35 ( ?) 




I Enoch 72-82 ; Book of Jubilees 




Testaments of XII Patriarchs 


105-104 


Aristobulus 


104-78 


Alexander Jannaeus 




I Enoch 1-5; 91-104 (Before 95) 



Chronological Table 237 



78-69 


Alexandra 


69-63 


Struggles of John Hyrcanus II and Aristo- 




bulus 




I Enoch 37-76 (The Similitudes) (Before 64) 


70-40 


Psalms of Solomon 


63 


Conquest of Palestine by Pompey 


60-40 


Eevision of Testaments of XII Patriarchs 


40 


Inroad of Parthians 


39-4 


Herod the Great 




Birth of Jesus (Between 8 and 4 B. C.) 


4 B. C. 


Accession of the sons of Herod 


4B. C.-7A. 


D. Assumption of Moses ( ?) 


6 A. D. 


Judea a Eoman province 




Eevolt of Judas the Galilean and Saddoc the 




Pharisee 


c. 26-28 


Messianic prophecies of John the Baptist 


c. 28-30 


Ministry of Jesus 




Increasing restiveness of Jews 


44 


Eevolt of Theudas 


40-70 


Parts of IV Ezra and II Baruch written 


40-60 


'Collection of Sayings of Jesus (Q) 


50-62 


Literary activity of Paul 


52-66 


Frequent outbreaks in Palestine 




Markan "fly-sheet" 


50-70 


Gospel of Mark 


64 


Burning of Eome; Neronian persecution 


c. 65 


I Peter 


66 


Outbreak of Jewish Wax 


70 


Fall of Jerusalem 


p. 70 


Apocalypse of (II) Baruch 


75-79 


Josephus writes Jewish War 


c. 80 


Gospel of Matthew 


80-100 


Apocalypse of (IV) Ezra 




Sibylline Oracles IV 




Pastoral Epistles (present form) 


90 


Council of Jamnia; close of O. T. canon 


90-100 


Epistle of James 




Epistle to Hebrews 




I Clement to Corinthians 


93 


Josephus writes Antiquities 



238 The Promise of His Coming 

95 Domitianic persecution 

Book of Eevelation 

p. 100 Gospel and epistles of John 

100-125 Jude (90-100?) 

c. 130 Didache 

125-150 II Peter; Apocalypse of Peter 



INDEX OF PASSAGES CITED 
Old Testament, Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha, 

OLD TESTAMENT 



Genesis 
i, 2 . . . 
ii, 5-7 
iii, 24 
xv, 5-8 
xlix . . 
xlix, 1 



48 
49 
41 
37 
38 
40 



Exodus 

xv, 3 

xvii, 15 f. . 
xix, 16 ... 
xxiii, 22 f. 
xxiv, 1-8 
xxxiv, 10 ff. 



. 41 
. 41 
.171 
. 34 
. 37 
. 36 



xxxiv, 27 f 36, 37 



Numbers 
xxi, 14 
xxiii f . . 



41 

38 



Deuteronomy 

iv, 24 187 

iv, 30 40 

ix, 3 187 

xxxii, 8 119 

xxxiii 38 

Joshua 

v, 13 

vii 



41 
38 



Judges 
v, 3, 5 
v, 4 f.. 
v, 23 
viii, 22 f 



11. 



33 
42 
41 

86 



I Samuel 

viii 86 

x, 17-27 86 

xii 86 

xvii, 26, 36, 45 41 

xviii, 17 41 

xxv, 28 41 

xxx, 26 41 

II Samuel 

vii, 8-16 37 

vii, 12-17 36 

xxi, 24 38 

I Kings 

xix, 18 77 

II Kings 

xiii, 14-19 35 

xiv, 25 ff 36 

xvi, 10-18 71 

Job 

iii, 8 120 

xxvi, 6 128 

xxvi, 12 f 48 

xxviii, 22 128 

xl, 15; xli, 34 48 

xli, 1 120 

Psalms 

ii, 6-9 84 

vi, 4 f 128 

vii, 12 41 

x, 1-18 94 

xxx, 9 128 

xxxvii 94 



239 



240 



INDEX OF PASSAGES CITED 



OLD TESTAMENT 



Psalms (Con.) 

xliii 

xliv 

xlix 

lxv, 6 ff 

lxxii 



94 

70 

129 

49 

84 

lxxiii 129 

lxxiv 91 

lxxiv, 12-15 46 

lxxiv, 13 f 106, 120 

lxxx, 15 f 91 

lxxxviii, 10 ff 128 

lxxxix, 6 ff 49 

lxxxix, 9 ff 48 

lxxxix, 10, 13 51 

lxxxix, 40-46 91 

xc, 4 132 

xciv, 17 128 

civ, 5-9 49 

cvii, 39-42 94 

eix, 21-31 94 

cxiii, 5-8 94 

cxv, 17 128 

cxxxvii, 7 40 

cxlvii, 2-6 94 



Ecclesiastes 

ii, 14 

vii, 15 . . . 
ix, 2, 9 f. . 



.129 
.129 
.129 



Isaiah 

i, 16 f 72, 83, 93, 213 

i, 18 83 

i, 24-29 81 

i, 25 78, 83 

i, 27 f 78 

ii, 2 40, 56 

ii, 2-4 54, 81, 134 

ii, 11, 12 40 

iv, 2 85 

iv, 2-6 81 

v, 1-7 71 

v, 18 f 32 

v, 26-30 62 

vi, 3 78 

vi, 11 ff 76, 77 

vii 85 



Isaiah (Con.) 

viii, 6 ff 62 

ix 85 

ix, 1-7 51, 81, 106 

ix, 4 40 

ix, 6 f 84f. 

x, 5 ff 62 

x, 21 ff 77 

x, 28-32 62 

xi 85 

xi, 1-10 ....57, 81, 84, 85, 106 

xi, 6 56 

xi, 6-9 83, 175 

xi, 10-xii, 6 81 

xiii 64, 90 

xiii, 9-11, 13 45 

xiii f 105 

xiv 90 

xv f 134 

xv-xviii 75 

xvii, 4-7 40, 77 

xix, 18-25 81 

xix 24 f 115 

xx 75 

xxiii, 15, 17 89 

xxiv-xxvii 105, 106 

xxiv, 13 73 

xxiv, 21-23 120 

xxv, 6 124 

xxvii 106 

xxvii, 1 48, 51, 120 

xxvii, 13 171 

xxviii, 17 45 

xxviii, 17 ff 44 

xxviii, 22 45 

xxix, 6 44 

xxx, 7 48 

xxx, 23 40 

xxx, 25 56 

xxx, 27, 30, 33 44 

xxxiii, 14 187 

xxxiv f 105, 106 

xxxiv, 4 f 120 

xxxiv, 5 41 

xxxiv, 8 40 

xxxvi, 14, 15, 18-20 71 

xxxvi, 22-31 90 

xxxvii 85 



INDEX OF PASSAGES CITED 



241 



OLD TESTAMENT 



Isaiah (Con.) 

xxxviii, 18 128 

xl-lxvi 105 

xl, 1 f 80 

xl 2 74 

xl, 4 56 

xl, 10 86 

xl, 27 74 

xli, 18 56 

xli, 18 ff 124 

xli, 21 86 

xlii, 1-4 74 

xlii, 4 90 

xlii, 5-9 87 

xlii, 16 56 

xlii, 23 ff 74 

xliii, 14, 15 86 

xliii, 19 f 56 

xliv, 28-xlv, 1 86 

xlix, 11 56 

li, 3 56, 124 

li, 9 120 

li, 9 f 48, 49 

li, 17-23 80 

liii, 4 90 

liii, 12 74, 90 

liv, 9 45 

lv, 13 124 

lix, 15-21 105, 174 

lx, 19 f 123 

lxiii, 1-6 105 

lxv, 17 123 

lxvi, 14-17 105 

lxvi, 16 41 

lxvi, 22 123 



Jeremiah 
i, 15 ., 
ii, 2 
iv ff.. 
iv, 9, 11. 



76 

76 

65 

40 

iv, 13 44 

iv, 25 76 

v, 14-17 56 

v, 28 93 

vii, 5 ff 93 

xiv, 7 ff 39 

xxiii, 1-8 85 



Jeremiah (Con.) 

xxiii, 3-8 106 

xxiii, 5, 7 40 

xxiii, 19 f 44, 63 

xxv, 11 f 89, 132 

xxv, 30 137 

xxv, 31 41, 76 

xxix, 10 89, 132 

xxxi, 1 40 

xxxi, 5 124 

xxxi, 27 40 

xxxi, 29-34 78 

xxxi, 31, 33 40, 83 

xxxi, 35-37 37 

xxxi, 38 40 

xxxiii, 14 f 40 

xxxiii, 20-22 37 

xliv, 16-18 71 

xlv-li 80 

xlvii, 6 41 

1 f 90, 105 

1, 35 ff 41 

li, 7 64 

li, 27 171 

Ezekiel 

i, 2 79 

ii, 1 163 

ii, 3 78, 163 

ii, 6, 8 163 

iii, 1, 4 163 

iii, 5-8, 21, 27 78 

iv, 1 163 

v, 5 f., 8-12 78 

vi, 8 78 

vii, 5 ff 63 

vii, 10, 12 40, 63 

xiii, 1, 8, 16 f., 23 79 

xviii, 4-20 78, 93 

xxi, 3 f., 8 ff 41 

xxi, 9 f., 19 64 

xxi, 14 41 

xxii, 7, 29 93 

xxii, 30 f 64 

xxv, 3 f. ,8 f., 12 f 80 

xxvi, 2 f 80 

xxviii, 13 5Q 

xxviii, 26 124 



242 



INDEX OF PASSAGES CITED 



OLD TESTAMENT 



Ezekiel (Con.) 

xxix-xxxii 64 

xxx, 9 40 

xxxii, 10 41 

xxxiv, 12, 17 78 

xxxiv, 26 f 124 

xxxvi, 22-31 87 

xxxvii, 3 163 

xxxvii, 21-28 106 

xxxvii, 24 f 86, 124 

xxxviii f 184 

xxxviii, 17 66 

xxxviii, 19-23 45, 65 

xxxix, 25-29 80 

xl-xlviii 86 

xlv, 7 ff 124 

xlvi, 16 ff 124 

xlvii, 1-12 56 

Daniel 

ii, 22 132 

ii, 44 123 

vii-xii 107 

vii 103 

vii, 3, 17 132 

vii, 9-27 126 

vii, 13 f 180 

viii 103 

ix, 1 f 98 

ix, 24-27 132 

x, 13, 20, 21 119 

xii. 1 119 

xii, 4, 9 102 

Hosea 

i, 10-ii, 1 81 

i. 11 40 

ii, 14-23 81 

ii, 18 40, 56 

ii, 22 f 124 

iii, 1-5 81 

iii, 5 40 

iv, 1-3 45 

v, 15-vi, 3 81 

ix, 11-16 76 

x, 9 40 

x, 12 81 

xi, 1-3 33 



Hosea (Con.) 

xi, 8-11 81 

xiii, 11 85 

xiii, 14a 81 

xiv, 1-9 81 

Joel 

ii, 21-30 168 

ii, 28 102 

ii, 31 168 

iii, 1 40 

iii, 1-17 105 

iii, 16 137 

iii, 18 40, 124 



Amos 
i f... 
i, 2 
i, 14 
ii, 6 . 
ii, 14 ff. 



. 75 
.137 
. 43 
. 93 
. 43 



ii, 16 31, 40 

iii, 2 34, 71 

iii, 12 77 

iv, 1 93 

iv, 6-12 67 

v, 7 93 

v, 15 77 

v, 18 ff 31, 53 

v, 20 81 

v, 21, 23 f 72 

vi, 1, 3 31 

vi, 3 31, 53 

viii, 9 T 31, 45 

viii, 13 31 

ix, 1 f 76 

ix, 3 48 

ix, 8-15 81 

ix, 13 f 124 



Obadiah 
i, 15 



.105 



Micah 
i, 3 f... 
ii, 1 f.. 
ii, 3 ff. 
ii, 4 



43 
93 
76 
40 



OLD TESTAMENT 



243 



INDEX OF PASSAGES CITED 



Micah (Con.) 

ii, 8 f 

iii, 1-4 

iii, 4 



93 
93 

72 



iii, 11 38 

iv-vii 81 

iv, 1 40, 56 

iv, 1-3 54, 55, 134 

v, 2, 4 106 

v, 10 40 

Nahum 

i, 2-8 53, 73 

i, 15 72 f. 

Habakkuk 

i, 2 69 

i, 5-11 63 

i, 12-17 73 

iii, 10 (LXX) 180 

Zephaniah 

i, 2 f 45, 76 

i, 4, 18 76 f. 

ii, 12 41 

iii, 1-5, 8 76 

iii, 19 f 40 



Haggai 

ii, 1-9 91 

ii, 3 198 

ii, 6 187 

ii, 20-23 91 

ii, 23 40 



Zechariah 

i-viii 105 f. 

iii f 91 

v, 1-4 106 

vi, 9-15 91 

viii, 23 40 

ix-xiv 105 f . 



ix 16 

xii, 10 ff.... 

xiii, 1 

xiii, 3 

xiv, 4, 6, 9. 

xiv, 6 f 

xiv, 8 



Malachi 
iii 

iii, 5 . 
iv, 5 f. 



. 40 
.180 
. 40 
. 98 
. 40 
.123 
. 56 



.106 
. 93 
.148 



APOCRYPHA AND PSEUDEPIGRAPHA 



Assumption of Moses 

i, 12 

vii, 1-6 

x, 1 

x, 3-7 

x, 10 



.115 
. 94 
.120 
.117 
.115 



II Baruch 

xiv, 19 

xxiv, 1-xxix 1. 

xxvii, 9 

xxix, 5 

xxxii, 4 ff . . . . 
xxxix 



.115 
.113 
.119 
.124 
.113 
.132 



xlix-lii 123 

liii-lxxiv 128 



IV EZRA 

iv, 36 ff 133 

v, 1-12 112 f. 

v, 56-vi, 6 118 

vi, 55-59 115 

vii, 11 115 

vii, 28 f 123 

vii, 39-42 119 

vii, 50, 112 ff 132 

xii 132 

xiii, 1-53 128 



xiv, 11 

I Enoch 
i-xxxvi 
i, 3-7 . . 



.133 



.123 
.117 



244 



INDEX OF PASSAGES CITED 



APOCRYPHA AND 
I Enoch (Con.) 

i, 7 ff 122 

i, 9 189 

x, 4-16 120 

x, 12 132 

x, 17 ff 124 

xii, 4 189 

xxv, 4 124 

xxxvii-lxx 123 

xxxviii, 4 f 120 

xlv, 4 f 123 

xlvi 156 

xlvi, 1-3 127 

xlvi, 3, 4 121 

xlvi, 4-8 120 

xlviii, 3-6 127 

xlviii, 4 121 

xlviii, 8-10 120 

xlix, 2, 4 121 

1, 2 f 135 

li, 2 121 

liii, 1-7 120 

lx, 8 189 

lxii, 1-12 120 f. 

lxii, 5 155 

lxii, 11 f 115 

lxii, 13 f 124 

lxiii 115, 120 

lxiii, 10 f 121 

lxix, 27 127 

lxxxiii-xc 102 

lxxxix, 59 ff 132 

lxxxix, 72 133 

xc, 24-26 120 

xc, 37 124 

xci, 5 ff 113 

xei, 9 135 

xci, 12 123 

xciii, 9 ..142 

xcv, 7 123 

xcviii, 12 123 

c, 1-3 113 

c, 4 120 

II Enoch 

xxxii, 2-xxxiii, 2 123 

xxxiii, 1 f 132 



PSEUDEPIGRAPHA 
Jubilees 

xxiii, 9-25 113 

xxiii, 26-29 116 

I Maccabees 

iv, 46 98 

ix, 27 98 

II Maccabees 

v, 2-4 119 

Psalms of Solomon 

ix, 17 ff 37 

xi, 1, 3 171 

xvii 94 

xvii, 23-38 126 

Sibylline Oracles 

iii, 97-828. 107 

iii, 652-656 124 

iii, 796-807 119, 124 

iv, 173-178 117 

Testaments Twelve Patriarchs 
Reuben vi, 7-12 125 

Levi iii, 10-iv, 1 112 

viii, 11-15 92 

viii, 14 125 

xviii 125 

xviii, 1-14 92, 116 

xviii, 9 115 

Judah, xxi, 7 92 

xxi, 17-xxii, 2 Ill f. 

xxii, 1 f 92 

xxiii, 1-3 112 

xxiv, 1 112 

xxiv, 1-3 125 

xxiv, 5 f 115, 125 

Dan vi, 1- 5 ...119 

Benj. ix, 2; x, 5, 10 136 



INDEX OF PASSAGES CITED 



245 



NEW TESTAMENT 



Matthew 

vi, 10 182 

x, 17-22 180 

x, 34 f 148 

xi, 3 149 

xi, 14 148 

xiii, 24-30 181 

xiii, 36-43, 47-50 181 

xvi, 13-28 149 

xvi, 28 181 

xvii, 11 ff 148 

xix, 28 181 

xxiv, 1-3 156 

xxiv, 3, 10-12 180 

xxiv, 14 180, 181, 200 

xxiv, 26 f 155, 157, 180 

xxiv, 28, 30 180 

xxiv, 37 ff 155, 157 

xxiv, 37-51 180 

xxiv, 42-51 158 

xxiv, 43 155 

xxv, 1-46 158, 180 

Mark 

i, 15 154 

ii, 10 163 

iii, 24-27 148 

iv, 26-29 181 

viii, 12 147 

viii, 27-ix, 1 149 

viii, 31 163 

viii, 38 149, 155, 157, 163 

ix, 1 155, 157, 163, 181 

ix, 9 163 

ix, 12 148, 163 

ix, 31 163 

x, 33 163 

x, 35-45 151 

x, 37 149 

x, 45 163 

xiii 107, 158 f., 210 

xiii, 1-4 156 

xiii, 5 f 157 

xiii, 7 f 155, 178 

xiii, 9-13 157, 180 

xiii, 12 148 

xiii, 14-20 155, 178 

xiii, 21 ff 157 



Mark (Con.) 

xiii, 24-29 155, 178 

xiii, 30 155, 157 

xiii, 30 f 178 

xiii, 32 157 

xiii, 33 155 

xiii, 33-37 158, 180 

xiv, 25 157 

xiv, 62 155, 157, 163 

Luke 

i, 51 ff 121 

vi, 20-26 121 

vi, 22 163 

vii, 19 149 

vii, 22 148 

vii, 34 163 

ix, 18-27 149 

ix, 58 163 

x, 17 f 148 

x, 17-24 214 

x, 18, 21 148 

x, 22 ff 149 

xi, 20 148, 182 

xii, 39 155 

xii, 39-46 158 

xii, 42-46 180 

xii, 52 ff 148 

xvi, 31 147 

xvii, 20-23 157 

xvii, 21 146, 148, 214 

xvii, 23 f 155, 157, 180 

xvii, 26 f 155, 180 

xvii, 26-29 157 

xvii, 34 1, 37 180 

xix, 10 163 

xxi, 24 214 

xxii, 20 83 

xxii, 30 181 

John 

iii, 17 ff 211 

xii, 24, 31 211 

xiv ff 210 

xiv, 12 212 

xiv, 18 f., 23 210 

xv, 4 210 

xv, 7, 16, 20 212 



246 



INDEX OF PASSAGES CITED 



NEW TESTAMENT 



John (Con.) 

xvi, 2 212 

xvi, 7, 16, 22 210 

xvi, 11 211 

xvi, 20, 33 212 

xvii, 15 213 

Acts 

ii, 17 102 

iii, 13-21 170 

Romans 

i, 4 174 

viii 210 

viii, 9-11 220 

viii, 18-22, 23 175 

xi, 24 ff 174 

xiii, 11 175 

xiii, 11 f 173 

xiv, 10 175 

I Corinthians 

i, 8 175 

iii, 12-15 60 

iii, 13 175 

iv, 4 f 175 

v, 5, 9 f 175 

vii, 26-31 173 

vii, 29-31 175 

xi, 25 83 

xv, 23 f 175 

xv, 23-26 174 

xv, 25 213 

xv, 28, 35-44, 50-53 175 

xv, 52 171 

xv, 56 174 

xv, 57 213 

xvi, 22 203 

II Corinthians 

iii, 6 83 

v, 1-5, 10 175 

Galatians 

v, 23 213 

Philippians 

iii, 20 174, 175 

iii, 21 175 

iv, 5 174 



Colossians 
ii, 15 .. 



.174 



I Thessalonians 

iv, 13-v, 10 171 

iv, 14-18 175 

v, 1-4 175 

II Thessalonians 

i, 4-10 172 

i, 7-10 175 

ii 172-175 

I Timothy 

iv, 1 188, 189 

vi, 15 189 



II Timothy 
ii, 11 f... 
iii, 1-3 
iii, 16 . . , 
iv, 3 



.189 
.188 
. 98 
.188 



Titus 
ii, 13 



.189 



Hebrews 

iii, 12-14 186 

iv, 9 187 

viii, 6-13 83 

ix, 11, 26 ff 187 

x, 23 f 186 

x, 35-38 187 

x, 37 198 

xii, 26-29 187 

James 

i, 12 187 

ii, 1-8 188 

iv, 13-16 188 

v, 1-6, 7-9 188 

I Peter 

i, 3-7, 13, 20 176 

iii, 22 176 

iv, 5-7, 13 176 

v, 1 .176 

v, 4 177 

v, 6 f., 10 176 



INDEX OF PASSAGES CITED 247 

NEW TESTAMENT 

II Peter Revelation 

i, 11 190 i, 5 183 

i, 21 98 i, 7 180 

iii, 3 f 189 i, 9 102 

iii, 4 206 ii, 16 175 

iii, 5-12 61 v, 5 102 

iii, 8 132 vi, 1-8 132 

iii, 8-13 190 vii, 14 184 

iii, 10 f 11 xii 102 

iii, 11 218 xii, 7 119 

xiii 102 

Jade xviii, 9 180 

6, 9 189 xx, 2 51 

14 f 122, 189 xx, 4 f., 7-12 184 

18 189 xxi, 1 51 

APOSTOLIC FATHERS 
I Clement Barnabas 
xxiii, 3-5 185 xv 132 



xxiii, 4 188 

[ Clement 
xi, 2-4 185 xvi, 3-8 190 f. 



Didache 
II Clement x, 6 203 



GENERAL INDEX 

Abomination of desolation, 177 f., 180 

Acts, Book of, 169 ff. 

Advent, see Second Advent 

Adventism, 10, 18, 195; see also Premillennialism 

Adventists, Seventh-Day, 18 ff. 

Ages, two, 132 

Akiba, Rabbi, 96 

Amos, 31, 60, 75, 76, 85 

Angelology, 119 

Anonvmity, 101 f., 107 

Antichrist, 119, 172 f., 174, 184, 191 

Antiochus Epiphanes, 91 

Apocalypse, the, see Revelation, Book of 

Apocalypse, defined, 102 

Apocalypse, Marcan, 108, 155 ff., 177, 209 

Apocalyptic literature, 26 f., 96, 101 ff., 104 ff., 108 f. 

Apocalyptic movement, 95 f.. 141 f. 

Apocalypticism: characteristics, 78 f., 110, 113 f., 130-139, 152, 193 f., 
196 f.; development, 138, 185, 192 ff.; ethics, 135; interpreta- 
tions, 158 ff., 202; mediaeval, 195; principles, 130-136; relation 
to prophets, 136 f.; "social-spiritual," 207-214; values, 134 ff., 
153, 217 f., 231; weaknesses, 130-134, 136 f.; see also Premil- 
lennialism, Pseudonymity 

Apostles, apocalypticism of, 167 ff. 

Ashur, 71 

Assize, Great, 222; see also Judgment 

Assumption of Moses, 94, 107, 123 

Augustine, 194 f. 

Ayer, Sri Krishna Murti, 13 

Assvrians, 57 

Babylon, 83 f., 89, 90, 99 f., 103 f. 

Bahaism, 13 

Bar-cochba, 90, 96 

II Baruch, 107, 108, 123 

III Baruch, 108 
Beloved Disciple, 208 
Behemoth, 48 
Bodies, spiritual, 175 
Bourignon, Antoinette, 13 
Buddha, 12 

249 



250 GENERAL INDEX 

Cambyses, 01 

Canon, Old Testament, 98 f., 142 

Captivity, Babylonian, 63 f. 

Catastrophe, apocalyptic, 150, 165, 181 f., 226 ff.; cosmic, 44, 64 f., 

116, 137, 147, 177 f.; historical, 63 ff.; in nature, 42, 51 f.; 

see also Conflagration, final 
Christ, 126, 128; see also Jesus 
Christianity, apocalyptic, 167-202; failure of, 1 f.; Jewish, 177, 1*3- 

185; non-apocalyptic, 207-214; practicable, 226; social, 16 
Chronological computations, 132 f. 
Civilization, failure of, 7f., 18 f., 22 f. 
Class consciousness, apocalyptic, 79, 121, 188; see also Mighty, 

Poor, Rich 
I Clement, 185 f. 
Comforter, the, 210 
Communion with Christ, 217 

Conflagration, final, 190: see also Catastrophe, World Conflagration 
Cosmogony, Babylonian, 48 
Court style, 51, 84 f. 

Covenant, with Yahweh, 33 f., 37 f.; the new, 83 f. 
Creation, 47 

Crises, signs of the end, 23 f. ; see also Catastrophe, Signs 
Critical views of prophecy, 57 
Cyrus, 86 f., 90 
Daniel, Book of, 98, 107 

Davidic dynasty, 51, 57, 84 f., 91, 94, 150; see also Messiah, Davidic 
Dav of the Lord, 175 

Day of Yahweh, 31 ff., 38 ff., 51 f., 61, 75, 79 f., 87, 113 f. 
Demonology, 51, 99, 119 f., 174 
Democracy and apocalypticism, 133 
Demonic hosts, 174; see also Demonology 
Determinism, 133, 199 
Devil, 51; see also Demonology 
Didache, see Teaching of the Twelve Apostles 
Disciples, misunderstand Jesus, 159 
Domitianic persecution, 182 f. 
Doubt, Hebrew, 68 f. 
Dragon, the, 51 f. 
Dualism, 119, 199 

Earth, evil, to be transformed, 123, 175 
Egypt, 7 ff., 57, 83 f., 206 
Eldad and Modad, Apocalypse of, 185 
Elephantine papyri, 97 n. 2 
End of world, 10 f., 18 ff., 199, 201 f., 214; see also Ages, two 

I Enoch, 107 

II Enoch, 107, 123 

Enochic Messiah, see Messiah, Enochic 
Eschatology, 26 ff., 58, 137 ff., 149 ff., 167 f., 184 
Eschatological, defined, 84 n. 3 



GENERAL INDEX 251 

Essenes, 140 

Ethics, 84 f., 138 

Evangelism, 9, 116, 142 f., 217 

Evil, increase of, 22, 20, 50; see also Last days, Last woes 

Evolution, 11 f., 28, 133, 226 

Exile, 70 f ., 88 ; see also Captivity 

Externalism, 133, 199 

Ezekiel, 52, 60, 63 f., 66, 73, 78-81, 86, 90, 105 f., 138, 184 

Ezra, 91, 97 

IV Ezra, 10S, 123 

Fall, the, 49 

Figurative interpretations, 160 

Final struggle, 174; see also Last woes 

Final victory, 175; see also Messianic victory 

Flood, the, 45, 47, 116 

Forerunners of the end, 37 : see also Signs 

Fourth Gospel, 208 ff. 

Future, glorious, 82 f. ; see also Golden Age, Millennium, New age, 
New era 

Garden of Eden, 46, 55 

Gentiles, 74, 115, 174 

God, nature of, 28, 32, 4] ff., 70 f., 84 ff. 

Gog and Magog, 65, 80, 184 

Golden Age, 9, 12, 53-56, 206; see also Future, glorious 

Gospel records, 159 

•"'Great Unknown," see Second Isaiah 

Habakkuk, 60, 73, 77 

Haggai, 90, 106 

Hebrews: apocalyptic hopes, 39-46; covenant with Yahweh, 32 f., 
36 f. ; history and religion, 33; mission, 34 f. ; mythology, 46-53, 
55 ff. ; national hopes, 38 ff.; patriotism, 35 f. ; theology, popu- 
lar, 32, 39-46, 53, 55, 59, 71 

Hebrews, Epistle to, 186 f. 

Hellenism, influence, 100 

Hermas, 190 

Hero, Savior-, 48, 50, 52, 55, 57 

Hezekiah, 85 

Hillel, 140 

Hinduism. 131 

Historical study, value of, 29 

Holy Spirit, 168, 210: see also Comforter 

Hope of repentance, 82 

Hopes: Assvrian, 57; Christian, 16 f., 18 f., 167-191; disappointed, 
5 f., 9, 65 f., 90 f., 185 f., 192, 197 f.; Egyptian, 9, 57; Hebrew, 
31-39, 53-59, see aso Hebrews; Jewish, 89-101, 128 f.; modern, 
12, 14 f.; prophetic, 77, 79-87, 134 ff., 143; war-time, 3 ff. 

Hosea, 60, 76, 84 f. 

Hosts of Yahweh, 61 ; see also Yahweh 

Idealism, 135 f., 224 ff. 



252 GENERAL INDEX 

Inspiration, 97 ff., 134, 198 f. 

Isaiah, 60, 62, 75, 77 f., 83 f.; see also Second Isaiah 

James, Epistle of, 187 

Jeremiah, 60, 62 f., 73, 75, 78, 83 f., 85 

Jerusalem, destruction of by Babylonians, 79; by Romans, 95 f., 177, 
179 f., 181, 214; after Restoration, 91 

Jesus, 75, 121, 128, 139, 174, 207 f.; as Judge, 175; life and char- 
acter, 27 f., 29, 160-165, 208; as messiah, 149, 151, 162, 168, 
174; problems and solutions, 144 f., 154, 161; return, 175, see 
also Second Advent; teachings, 145-150, 153-158, 159, 166; temp- 
tation, 150 f. 

Jewish sects, 141 f.; see also Judaism, parties; Pharisees, Sadducees, 
Zelots 

Jewish war of 66-70, 95 

Jews: conversion of, 37, 174; foreign influences on, 99 f.; see Hopes, 
Jewish, and Judaism 

Joel, 99, 105, 168 

John, Gospel of, see Fourth Gospel 

John Hyrcanus, 92 

Joshua, son of Jehozadak, 91 

Jubilees, Book of, 107, 116, 122 f. 

Judaism, apocalyptic, 101-139; history, 89-96; hopes disappointed, 
90 f.; parties, 140-144, see also Jewish sects; religion, 97-101 

Jude, 189 

Judgment, day of, 113 ff. ; final, 158, 175, 180, 201; objects, and pur- 
pose, 75 f., 80, 87 f., 114, 119-122; reinterpretation, 211, 221 

Kali Yuga, 131 

Kalki, 12 

Kingdom of God, 17, 32, 86, 92, 122 f., 141, 146, 150, 154, 164, 175, 
182, 212 f. 

Kingdom of Heaven 182; see also Kingdom of God 

Last days, 110 ff., 168, 190 

Last woes, 92, 110 f., 178, 183; see also Evil, increase of 

Law, the, 91, 97 f., 101, 116, 141, 145 

League of Nations, 24 f. 

Lee, Ann, 13 

Legalism, Jewish, 138, 141, 145; see also Law 

Leviathan, 48 f., 51, 106 

Literalism, 133 f., 195, 198 f. 

Literary problems in the Old Testament. 81 f. 

"Little While," a, 186, 198, 210, 220 f. 

Lord's Prayer, 148 

Luke, 213 f. 

II Maccabees, 123 

IV Maccabees, 123 

Maccabees, times of, 91, 106 f. 

Mahdi, 12 

Malachi, 91, 97, 105 

Marduk, 48 f., 51 



GENERAL INDEX 253 

Mark, Gospel of, see Apocalypse, Marcan 

Matthew, Gospel of, 179-182 

Messiah, 27, 51, 56 f., 84 f., 124 ff., 161 f., 168, 174; angelic, 126; 

Davidic, 125 f., 161; Enochic, 147, 150 f., see also Son of Man; 

Levitic, 125; superhuman, 85, 126 f., see also Son of Man; 

wanting, 124 f. 
Messianic hopes, see Hopes, Messiah 
Messianic Kingdom, 175, see also Kingdom of God 
Messianic victory, 125 f., 211, 214, 223 f. 
Micah, 60, 76, 84 f. 
Mighty, overthrow of, 120 

Milleniarianism, 12 f., 194 fF.; see also Premillennialism 
Millennium, IS, 37, 175, 183; see also Apocalypticism, Eschatology, 

Hopes. 
Millerism, 10 
Mirza Ali Mohammed, 13 
Missionary spirit, 16 f., 34 
Mohammed, 12 
Moloch, 84 

Monster, primeval, 48 ff. 
Montanists, 194 

Moralitv, 78, 87, 105, 129; see also Ethics 
Mythology, 46-53, 57, 87, 99 f., 103, 197 
Nahum, 52, 60, 64, 73, 77 

Nationalism, Jewish, 69, 92, 114; see also Hopes 
Nature, transformation of, 56; see also Earth 
Nebuchadnezzar, 63, 71, 79 
Nehemiah, 91, 97 
Nero, 184 
New Age, 39, 46, 81 ff., 92, 106, 122-124, 148 f., 155 f.; see also 

Future, glorious 
New era, 4, 82; see also New Age 
New Testament and Apocalyptic literature, 113 f. 
New Testament times, 140-144, 153 f. 
Nineveh, 73 
Optimism, 21, 212 
Order of the Golden Age, 12 
Orthodoxy, 22, 141 
Other worldliness, 117, 200, 225 
Quietism^ 61, 141 
Parables of Jesus, 181 

Paradise, primitive, 47 ; see also Garden of Eden 
Particularism, Jewish, 114 f.; see also Nationalism 
Passivism, 117, 141 
Paul, 60, 170-175, 213, 225 
Peace, world, 5f., 10, 56 
"People of the land," 143 f. 
Persia, 90, 99 f. 
Pessimism, 7 ff., 131, 188 f., 191 



254 GENERAL INDEX 

I Peter, 176 

II Peter, 189 

Pharisees, 92-94, 98, 100, 121, 140, 144 f.; see also Legalism 

Philosophy of history, 130 

Poor, elevation of, 167; see also Class Consciousness, Mighty, Rich 

Portents, see Signs 

Postmillennialism, 13 f., 200 f,; criticised, 207 

Premillennialism, 9 ff., 19 fT., 158, 195, 207; criticised, 197-200, 
207 f.; origin, 197; reinterpreted, 207-234; values, 215-218; 
see also Apocalypticism 

Prophecy, 10, 81, 98 f., 101 f.; Apocalyptic and, 136 f.; fulfillment, 
114, 134, 148; literary problems, 39, 46 f., 81 

Prophets, the, 35, 54, 61, 116, 153; contribution, 72 f, 87 f., 146 ff., 
154; misinterpretation of, 64 fT., 133 f., 198 f.; false, 72 f. 

Psalms of Solomon, 94, 103, 107, 123 

Pseudonomity, 101 f., 107 ; see also Anonymity, Apocalypticism 

Punishment for sin, 71; sec also Judgment 

Rahab, 48, 51; see also Monster 

Rapture of saints, 175; see also Resurrection 

Reconstruction, 3 fT., 20, 25 

Reformation, the, 195 

Reign of God, spiritual, 175; see also Kingdom of God 

Religion, Hebrew, 69 f., 73, 75, 78, 82, 87, see also Hebrews; develop- 
ment of, 97, 137; Jewish, see Judaism; national, 68 f. 

Remnant, salvation of, 77 

Repentance, 116; see also Hope of repentance 

Restoration, 20, 89 f. 

Resurrection, 128 f., 175, 201 

Return of Christ, visible, 199, 201; see also Second Advent 

Return of the Jews, see Restoration 

Revelation, Book of, 108, 183, 194, 204 

Revelation, progressive, 215 f. 

Revolts, Jewish, 95 f. ; see also Bar-cochba, Jewish war 

Rewards and punishments, 129 f., 171 f. ; see also Judgment 

Rich, overthrow of, 167, 188: see also Class Consciousness 

Roman Empire, 92, 95, 173 f., 184 

Russell, Pastor, 13 

Sabbath, 141 

Sacrifice, 163 f. ; see also Suffering 

Sadducees, 93 f., 120, 140, 144 f. 

Saoshyant, 12 

Satan, 51, 120 

Saul, 86 

Savior-Hero, see Hero 

Schweitzer, Albert, 27 f. 

Scribes, 99, 140 

Scriptures, 141 ; see also Inspiration 

Sea, 48, 51 : see also Monster 

Second Advent, 10, 20 f. 5 142 f., 149, 165, 168, 175, 178, 181, 191, 
203, 210, 223 f . : delayed, 181, 185, 189, 198 



GENERAL INDEX 255 

Second Coming, see Second Advent 

Second Isaiah, 73 f., 86, 90, 105 f., 110, 138, 151 f.; see also Isaiah 
Sectarianism, apocalyptic, 114 
Serpent, the, 4S f., 51 

Servant of Yahweh, see Suffering Servant 

Service through suffering, 74, 88, 90 f., 151 ff. ; see also Suffering 
Shakers, 13, 195 
Shamai, 140 
Sheol, 128 

Sibulline Oracles, 107, 108, 123 
Sign of the Son of Man, 180 
Signs of the end, 10 f., 21 ff., 67, 191 
Signs of the times, 178, 229 f. 
Simon the Maccabee, 92 
Social Christianity, 16, 207, 214 
Social reform, 19, 93 ff., 224 
Social unrest, 4 f., 7 ff., 143 ff., 214 
Social interpretation of apocalyptic, 224 f. 
Sociology, 14 f. 
Son of God, 162 

Son of Man, 120, 126 ff., 154-157, 161-164 
Spirit, Holy, see Holy Spirit 
Spiritualism, 11 f. 
Stoics, 60, 190 

Suffering of righteous, 93, 129, 157; see also Service through suf- 
fering 
Suffering Servant, 74, 87, 151 ff. 

Suffering, vicarious, 74 : see also Service through suffering 
Supernatural, the, 28 
Supernaturalism, 17 ff., 117 
Symbolical language, 102 f., 165 f. 
Talmud, 96 

Teaching of the Twelve Apostles, 190 f. 
Teed, Cyrus R., 13 
Tehom, 4& f. 

Temple, destruction of, 177 
Temptation of Jesus, 150 f. 

Testaments of the Twelve Patriarchs, 103, 107; Levi, 116, 122 
Theology: liberal, 15 f., 27 f. ; popular Hebrew, see Hebrews 
Theosophy, 12 
Tiamat, 48 f. 

Timothy, Epistles to, 188 f. 
Titus, 188 f. 

Universalism, 55, 115, 182 
Universe, transformation of; see Earth 
Utopia, Ezekiel's, 90 
Vegetarianism, 12 

Victory, final, see Messianic victory 
Vindication of righteousness, 122, 223 f.; see also Messianic victory 



256 GENERAL INDEX 

Vindictiveness of apocalyptists, 115 

Visions of apocalyptists, 102 f. 

War in heaven, 119 

War psycho] ogv, 4 f. 

War, the World, 1, 4, 5, 22 ff. 

Watchfulness, need of, 180 

World conflagration, 60 f., 189 f.; see also Catastrophe, cosmic 

World catastrophe, see Catastrophe, cosmic 

World, evil, 117, 123, 199; see also Evil, increase of 

Wrede, Wilhelm, 27 f. 

Yahweh, character and qualities, 32 f., 36, 41 f., 52, 75 ff., 84 f.; 

see also covenant, God, nature of: Yahweh of Hosts, 52; powers 

questioned, 70 f.; sword of, 41, 51, 63, 140 f. 
Zechariah, 90 
Zephaniah, 52, 60, 75 f. 
Zerubbabel, 86, 91, 106 
Zelots, 95 f., 140, 143 ff., 150, 164 
Zoroaster, 119 



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